Under the Animal Welfare Act, on-farm self-monitoring using appropriate animal welfare indicators has been mandatory for all livestock farmers in Germany since 1 February 2014. The aim is to gather information on the welfare of farm animals so that appropriate management measures can be taken at the first sign of pain, suffering or injury. Furthermore, animal welfare indicators enable the recording of the direct effects of animal husbandry systems and management on farm animals and are therefore playing an increasingly important role in quality assurance systems and in legal matters. But what are key animal welfare indicators in laying hen farming and how can these be collected? On this topic, the State Research Institute for Agriculture and Fisheries of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania hosted an online seminar in April 2021 as part of the ‘Fokus Tierwohl’ network, funded by the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture.

Assessing animal health using animal welfare indicators

Dr Helen Louton, Professor of Animal Health and Welfare at the Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences at the University of Rostock, spoke about the possibilities for assessing animal health in laying hen flocks using animal welfare indicators. She considers a sample size of approximately 50 birds per pen to be a representative sample for assessing the health status of the laying hen flock. Regular checks of the birds for plumage damage, skin and toe injuries, as well as changes to the footpads and sternum damage, can provide information on whether the health status of the laying hens in the flock is satisfactory. If, on the other hand, an increased incidence of injuries and feather damage is observed, this may indicate behavioural disorders such as cannibalism and feather pecking. Similarly, unsuitable housing facilities and health problems may be the cause of the feather damage observed. On a scale ranging from ‘no damage’ to ‘severe damage’, the livestock farmer should therefore carry out an assessment at regular intervals in order to eliminate the triggers for secondary diseases as quickly as possible. Injured and sick animals should be identified during daily inspections and immediately housed separately to facilitate their recovery.

The second speaker at the seminar was Dr Ruben Schreiter from the Centre for Applied Research and Technology at HTW Dresden, who spoke on the topic of ‘Laying performance and egg characteristics: animal welfare indicators for assessing flock health’. Dr Schreiter highlighted the laying hens’ remarkable biological performance, which averages 20 to 21 kg of egg mass per hen per laying year. Egg quality plays a significant role in ensuring smooth marketing. The proportion of so-called secondary eggs – that is, eggs that do not fall into grade A, such as soiled, blood-spotted or cracked eggs – can, amongst other things, indicate shortcomings in the housing environment and barn technology. A behavioural disorder triggered by a nutrient deficiency can also lead to secondary eggs. Not least, these are relevant to economic success. In a farm with 15,000 laying hens, a 1% increase in secondary eggs can already result in a loss of 1,800 euros per year. Therefore, regular monitoring of the parameters of laying performance, soiling levels and egg deformation is of vital importance both for assessing health status and for ensuring the farm’s economic success.   

Collection of animal welfare indicators at the slaughterhouse

At the end of the event, seminar participants were able to accompany Dr Lisa Jung (University of Kassel) on a virtual tour of the slaughterhouse and learn at which stages of production the collection of selected indicators at the ‘bottleneck’ of the slaughterhouse is theoretically possible, and what findings are already available in practice. Among the first pieces of information collected at the slaughterhouse is the proportion of transport losses. The main causes of animal mortality are heat stress, excessive stocking densities in transport crates, animals that are too thin or too heavy, and a long journey time to the slaughterhouse. To date, no further indicators are recorded during the slaughter process until the post-mortem examination. In general, the assessment of animal-related indicators would require trained staff or automatic recording systems, the funding and regular maintenance of which remain unresolved. Furthermore, it would need to be ensured that the surveys take place in all slaughterhouses, including those in German border regions.

Author: Patricia Lößner, State Research Institute for Agriculture and Fisheries, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania