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Animals
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Precision Animal Management: Housing Environment and Animal Well-Being
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Precision Animal Management: Housing Environment and Animal Well-Being

A special issue of Animals (ISSN 2076-2615). This special issue belongs to the section "Animal Welfare".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 April 2023) | Viewed by 8815

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Lilong Chai

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Poultry Science, University of Georgia, Athens, GA, USA
Interests: animal environment; poultry housing; precision animal farming; sustainable agriculture
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Yang Zhao

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Animal Science, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA
Interests: animal smart sensoring; robotics; behavior monitoring; welfare assessment; airborne transmission of pathogens; and environment management
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue the second edition of Housing Environment and Farm Animals' Well-Being (https://www.mdpi.com/journal/animals/special_issues/Housing_Environment_Farm_Animals).

Housing environment affects the health and well-being of farm animals, including livestock and poultry raised in concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs). Poor thermal, lighting, air, and other relevant environment may cause animals health to deteriorate over time in CAFOs. Maintaining or improving the housing environment is critical to enhancing the well-being of farm animals.

This Special Issue of Animals “Housing Environment and Farm Animals' Well-Being” is seeking submissions of original research, review, and communication related to livestock and poultry environmental management, air-quality control, emissions mitigation, and assessment of animal health and well-being. This issue will provide references for researchers, students, and animal agriculture producers to enhance on-farm environmental management and animal well-being.

Dr. Lilong Chai
Dr. Yang Zhao
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Animals is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

14 pages, 4147 KiB  
Article
Impact of Heat Stress on Blood, Production, and Physiological Indicators in Heat-Tolerant and Heat-Sensitive Dairy Cows
by Xiaoyang Chen, Hang Shu, Fuyu Sun, Junhu Yao and Xianhong Gu
Animals 2023, 13(16), 2562; https://doi.org/10.3390/ani13162562 - 09 Aug 2023
Viewed by 1191
Abstract
Heat stress affects production and health in cows severely. Since it is difficult to define heat-tolerant animals, studies of response to heat stress are important for understanding dairy cows’ health and production. However, information on the impact of heat stress on various indicators [...] Read more.
Heat stress affects production and health in cows severely. Since it is difficult to define heat-tolerant animals, studies of response to heat stress are important for understanding dairy cows’ health and production. However, information on the impact of heat stress on various indicators in heat-tolerant and heat-sensitive cows is sparse. This study aimed to investigate the effects of heat stress (HS) on blood, production, and physiological indicators in heat-tolerant and heat-sensitive cows. A total of 43 dairy cows were used from 9 May to 7 August 2021, under Temperature–Humidity Index (THI) measurements that ranged from 65.9 to 86.7. We identified cows that were tolerant or sensitive to HS based on the slope of the response of physiological and production traits against THI during the HS period by using a clustering method. After HS, serum glucose (Glu), cortisol (COR), 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT), and interleukin-6 (IL-6) levels of cows in the heat-tolerant group were lower than in the heat-sensitive group (p < 0.05). With THI as the predictor, the R2 for predicting respiration rate (RR) and body surface temperature (BT) in heat-tolerant cows was 0.15 and 0.16, respectively, whereas the R2 for predicting RR and BT in heat-sensitive cows was 0.19 and 0.18, respectively. There were low to moderate, positive correlations between RR, BT, and MY with THI, with Pearson correlation coefficients ranging from r = 0.11 to 0.4 in the heat-tolerant group, and from r = 0.24 to 0.43 in the heat-sensitive group. There was a low positive correlation between VT and THI, with a Spearman correlation coefficient of r = 0.07 in the heat-sensitive group. The heat-tolerant dairy cows had lower MY losses and had lower MY (p = 0.0007) in mixed models. Heat-tolerant cows with low-stress levels, through upregulating RR rapidly, increased their adaptability to thermal environments. They have better thermoregulation capability; the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis regulated the thermoregulatory in animals by releasing a variety of neurotransmitters and hormones. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Precision Animal Management: Housing Environment and Animal Well-Being)
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16 pages, 2674 KiB  
Article
Effects of Different-Sized Cages on the Production Performance, Serum Parameters, and Caecal Microbiota Composition of Laying Hens
by Yi Wan, Qiang Du, Duobiao Wang, Ruiyu Ma, Renrong Qi, Rongbin Yang, Xin Li, Junying Li, Wei Liu, Yan Li and Kai Zhan
Animals 2023, 13(2), 266; https://doi.org/10.3390/ani13020266 - 12 Jan 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1489
Abstract
The effects of four different-sized cages—huge (HC), large (LC), medium (MC), and small (SC) cages—on the productive performance, serum biochemical indices, and caecal microbiota composition of Roman laying hens were investigated. At 44 weeks of age, a total of 450 hens were selected [...] Read more.
The effects of four different-sized cages—huge (HC), large (LC), medium (MC), and small (SC) cages—on the productive performance, serum biochemical indices, and caecal microbiota composition of Roman laying hens were investigated. At 44 weeks of age, a total of 450 hens were selected and allocated to the four groups, with six replicates each. Equal stocking density (0.054 m2 per bird) was maintained among the four groups throughout the experiment, and number of birds/cage changed for each treatment. After 2 weeks of preliminary trial, the formal experiment was performed from 46 to 60 weeks of age. The laying rate and feed conversion ratio (FCR) were determined daily, antibody titres were measured every 3 weeks, and serum biochemical parameters and caecal microbiota composition were analysed at 60 weeks of age. Compared to HC and SC, the higher laying rate and lower FCR in MC and LC indicated positive effects on egg production and feed efficiency, while SC showed the highest body weight gain (p < 0.05). With increasing cage size, the serum triglycerides (TG) and total cholesterol (T-CH) levels were reduced, and serum glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) activity improved, where birds raised in HCs had the lowest serum TG and T-CH and the highest GSH-Px activity. Twenty-nine different phyla and 301 different genera were detected in the caecal microbiota of birds in the four groups. Methanobrevibacter was significantly higher in the SC than in the other groups (p < 0.05). Faecalibacterium was most abundant in the MC compared with the other groups (p < 0.05) and was significantly positively correlated with serum GSH-Px concentration (R = 0.214, p = 0.0017). Lactobacillus was significantly less abundant in the LC and MC than in the HC and SC groups (p < 0.05) and was significantly positively correlated with body weight (R = 0.350, p = 0.0009) but negatively correlated with laying rate and FCR. In conclusion, MC were superior to HC and LC in improving feed conversion efficiency and caecal microflora composition compared to the SC. An appropriate increase in cage size is beneficial to laying hen production and health. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Precision Animal Management: Housing Environment and Animal Well-Being)
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12 pages, 2675 KiB  
Article
Monitoring Behaviors of Broiler Chickens at Different Ages with Deep Learning
by Yangyang Guo, Samuel E. Aggrey, Peng Wang, Adelumola Oladeinde and Lilong Chai
Animals 2022, 12(23), 3390; https://doi.org/10.3390/ani12233390 - 02 Dec 2022
Cited by 14 | Viewed by 2404
Abstract
Animal behavior monitoring allows the gathering of animal health information and living habits and is an important technical means in precision animal farming. To quickly and accurately identify the behavior of broilers at different days, we adopted different deep learning behavior recognition models. [...] Read more.
Animal behavior monitoring allows the gathering of animal health information and living habits and is an important technical means in precision animal farming. To quickly and accurately identify the behavior of broilers at different days, we adopted different deep learning behavior recognition models. Firstly, the top-view images of broilers at 2, 9, 16 and 23 days were obtained. In each stage, 300 images of each of the four broilers behaviors (i.e., feeding, drinking, standing, and resting) were segmented, totaling 4800 images. After image augmentation processing, 10,200 images were generated for each day including 8000 training sets, 2000 validation sets, and 200 testing sets. Finally, the performance of different convolutional neural network models (CNN) in broiler behavior recognition at different days was analyzed. The results show that the overall performance of the DenseNet-264 network was the best, with the accuracy rates of 88.5%, 97%, 94.5%, and 90% when birds were 2, 9, 16 and 23 days old, respectively. In addition, the efficient channel attention was introduced into the DenseNet-264 network (ECA-DenseNet-264), and the results (accuracy rates: 85%, 95%, 92%, 89.5%) confirmed that the DenseNet-264 network was still the best overall. The research results demonstrate that it is feasible to apply deep learning technology to monitor the behavior of broilers at different days. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Precision Animal Management: Housing Environment and Animal Well-Being)
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15 pages, 3789 KiB  
Article
Effects of Swimming Pool Conditions and Floor Types on White Roman Geese’s Physical Condition Scores and Behaviors in an Indoor Rearing System
by Shih-Chieh Liao, Pei-Xuan Lyu, Shih-Yi Shen, Chih-Chang Hsiao, Ching-Yi Lien, Sheng-Der Wang, Tsung-Yi Lin and Po-An Tu
Animals 2022, 12(23), 3273; https://doi.org/10.3390/ani12233273 - 24 Nov 2022
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1550
Abstract
Biosecurity problems, including the continual risk of avian influenza spread by wild birds, have severely affected traditional free-range waterfowl production systems. Regulations and techniques for indoor goose production require more considerations for animal welfare. This study investigated the effects of swimming pool conditions [...] Read more.
Biosecurity problems, including the continual risk of avian influenza spread by wild birds, have severely affected traditional free-range waterfowl production systems. Regulations and techniques for indoor goose production require more considerations for animal welfare. This study investigated the effects of swimming pool conditions and different floor types on the physical condition scores and behaviors of indoor-reared White Roman geese. A total of 48 male and 48 female White Roman geese reared from the age of 15 to 84 days were randomly allocated to pens with or without a swimming pool and with either mud or perforated plastic floors. Providing a swimming pool improved geese’s eye and feather cleanliness and breast blister scores at the age of 84 days. Compared with geese reared on a mud floor, those reared on a perforated plastic floor had better feather cleanliness and higher breast blister scores at the age of 56 and 84 days. Providing a swimming pool to indoor-reared geese may reduce the proportion of abnormal behaviors, such as injurious feather pecking, by increasing water-related behaviors. This study suggests a more appropriate environment design for better balancing commercial goose production with animal welfare in an indoor rearing system. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Precision Animal Management: Housing Environment and Animal Well-Being)
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15 pages, 2254 KiB  
Article
Effect of Ultraviolet Radiation on Reducing Airborne Escherichia coli Carried by Poultry Litter Particles
by Xuan Dung Nguyen, Yang Zhao, Jeffrey D. Evans, Jun Lin, Brynn Voy and Joseph L. Purswell
Animals 2022, 12(22), 3170; https://doi.org/10.3390/ani12223170 - 16 Nov 2022
Viewed by 1412
Abstract
Airborne Escherichia coli (E. coli) originating in poultry houses can be transmitted outside poultry farms through the air, posing risks of barn-to-barn infection through airborne transmission. The objective of this study is to examine the effect of ultraviolet (UV) light on [...] Read more.
Airborne Escherichia coli (E. coli) originating in poultry houses can be transmitted outside poultry farms through the air, posing risks of barn-to-barn infection through airborne transmission. The objective of this study is to examine the effect of ultraviolet (UV) light on the inactivation of airborne E. coli carried by poultry dust particles under laboratory conditions. A system containing two chambers that were connected by a UV scrubber was designed in the study. In the upstream chamber of the system, airborne E. coli attached to dust particles were aerosolized by a dry aerosolization-based system. Two sets of air samplers were placed in the two chambers to collect the viable airborne E. coli. By comparing the concentration of airborne E. coli in the two chambers, the inactivation rates were calculated. The airborne E. coli inactivation rates were tested at different contact times with the aid of a vacuum pump (from 5.62 to 0.23 s of contact time) and different UV irradiance levels (of 1707 µW cm−2 and 3422 µW cm−2). The inactivation rates varied from over 99.87% and 99.95% at 5.62 s of contact time with 1707 µW cm−2 and 3422 µW cm−2 of UV irradiance to 72.90% and 86.60% at 0.23 s of contact time with 1707 µW cm−2 and 3422 µW cm−2 of UV irradiance. The designed system was able to create the average UV irradiation of 1707 µW cm−2 and 3422 µW cm−2 for one UV lamp and two UV lamps, respectively. The findings of this study may provide an understanding of the effect of UV light on the inactivation of airborne E. coli carried by dust particles and help to design an affordable mitigation system for poultry houses. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Precision Animal Management: Housing Environment and Animal Well-Being)
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