Effects of providing a roof and locating food in an outside yard on behaviour of sheep kept in winter conditions

Conclusion

Utilizing an outdoor yard as part of the total area may be a cost effective way to meet new space regulations for sheep production.

We found no indicators of reduced welfare due to weather factors throughout winter.

If a dry and comfortable resting area is offered indoors, the feed should be located in the outdoor yard to ensure undisturbed resting.

A roof covering the outdoor area might be beneficial in areas with large amounts of snow and rain or in organic farms that are collecting the manure for later use.

Background and aim In Nordic countries sheep are normally housed

during winter in insulated buildings with slatted floor pens and a space allowance between 0.7 and 0.9 m2/ewe.

New EU regulations for organic sheep production require at least 1.5 m2 /ewe. This means that many farmers need to extend their sheep barns or reduce their herd by almost half.

The aim of this experiment was to investigate the effects of roof cover and location of feed on sheep’s use of an outdoor yard under different winter weather conditions.

Materials and methods

A 2 x 2 factorial experiment was conducted with roof covering of outdoor yard (yes or no) and location of feed (indoors or outdoors) in four different pens, each with one of four possible combinations of these factors (Fig 1).

Figure 1. The experimental barn and the four pens with different combinations of feed location and roof over the outdoor yard.

Four groups with five adult ewes of the Norwegian white breed were rotated between the treatment pens. Digital video recordings were performed once a week for 24 hours from November 2009 to March 2010.

Results In general, sheep spent more time in outdoor

yards that were covered with a roof (Table 1).

More sheep were resting in outdoor yards that were covered with a roof compared to in yards that did not have a roof cover (Table 1).

Locating the feed outdoors increased the

time spent resting indoors (Table 1).

Only resting behaviour was affected by the weather, where sheep spent less time resting during mild weather and rain (Fig 2). The longest resting times were found during cold weather with snow (Fig 2).

Figure 2. Effects of weather factors on resting behaviour

Poster nr. 33

Accepted for publication in the Canadian Journal of Animal Science 2011

Grete H.M. Jørgensena and Knut E. Bøeb aBioforsk, Norwegian Institute for Agricultural and Environmental Research, P.O. Box 34, N-8860 Tjøtta Norway bDepartment of Animal and Aquacultural Sciences, Norwegian University of Life Sciences UMB, P.O. box 5003, N-1432 Aas Norway

Feed rack Feed rack

Feed rackFeed rack

Open Roof Roof Open

Pen 4 Pen 3 Pen 2 Pen 1

1880

1880

2400

Passage

a+bSouth

North

c+e

d+f

g

Water bucket

Indo

ors

Outd

oors

Table 1. Effect of roof over outdoor yard and feed location on general activity and behavioural synchrony * <0.05 ** <0.01 *** <0.0001

Mean % of tot. obs

Effect of roof over yard   Effect of feed location

Roof No roof   Indoors Outdoor yard

               

Resting 60.6 ± 1.7

58.1 ± 1.7

***   57.7 ± 1.760.9 ±

1.7***

- inside barn 36.3 ± 1.6

42.6 ± 1.8

NS   31.6 ± 1.547.4 ±

1.5***

- outdoor yard

24.2 ± 1.4

15.5 ± 1.2

**   26.2 ± 1.413.5 ±

0.7**

Feeding 26.0 ± 1.2

24.7 ± 1.3

NS   25.3 ± 1.225.5 ±

1.3NS

Stand /walk 13.4 ± 0.8

17.1 ± 0.8

**   16.9 ± 0.913.6 ±

0.7**

- inside barn 6.8 ± 0.5 8.7 ± 0.5 **   8.2 ± 0.45 7.4 ± 0.5 NS

- outdoor yard

6.5 ± 0.4 8.4 ± 0.6 **   8.7 ± 0.6 6.2 ± 0.4 **

               

In outdoor yard

43.8 ± 1.3

36.3 ± 1.4

*   34.8 ± 1.445.2 ±

1.2**

               

Resting simultaneously

34.0 ± 1.2

29.1 ± 1.3

**   31.4 ± 1.331.7 ±

1.3NS

grete.jorgensen@bioforsk.no