Dr Chandan Kumar, Dr R D Yadav and Dr Ajay Kumar
DUVASU, Mathura (UP)
Environmental enrichment refers to practices and modifications designed to enhance the living conditions of animals in captivity, aiming to improve their physical and psychological well-being. This concept is widely used in zoos, aquariums, laboratories, and farms to ensure that animals have stimulating and diverse environments that encourage natural behaviors and improve their overall quality of life.
Benefits of environmental enrichment include:
- Reduced stress and anxiety
- Improved physical health
- Enhanced reproductive efficiency
- Animal welfare status increased
- Human-Animal Interaction improved
- Productivity increased
Dairy farming is shifting to an intensive production model that restricts the expression of animals’ natural behaviors. Dairy cows rose for high yields frequently experience production and reproduction stress. Dairy cows exhibit decreased milk output in conditions of increasing stress which may be in the form of bad housing, bad interactions with cows or bad management. Even chronic stress and restrictions to express the behavior are not desired, both from an ethical and physiological point of view. Thus, the addition of enriching amendments could result in a significant improvement in an animal’s physiology in environments that are prone to stress. Environment enrichment also helps animals cope with stressors in their environment, reduce frustration, boost the fulfillment of behavioral demands, and encourage more positive emotional states. Therefore, effective environmental management is crucial to optimizing business success as well as the comfort and health of animals.
Environmental enrichment for cows is essential to improve their welfare, productivity, and overall health. Here are key areas and methods of environmental enrichment specifically for cattle:
1. Physical Enrichment
- Shelter: Providing adequate space for movement and shelter from extreme weather conditions is crucial. Well-designed barns, open pastures, and shaded areas help maintain comfort.
- Floor type: Soft, clean bedding materials like straw, sand, or mats can improve comfort and encourage resting behavior. Muddy or hard surfaces should be minimized.
- Loafing or exercise Areas: Access to open pastures or exercise yards allows cattle to exhibit natural behaviors like grazing, walking, and running.
2. Sensory Enrichment
- Visual Stimulation: Varied environments with different visual stimuli, such as fellow member’s conditions, nearby presence of bull, tree inside the housing area, pastureland with trees, water sources, and different plant types, can keep cattle mentally engaged.
- Auditory Stimulation: Natural sounds or calming music can have a positive effect on cattle, reducing stress levels.
- Olfactory Stimulation: Introducing new scents in the environment, such as herbs or essential oils, can stimulate cattle’s sense of smell and curiosity.
3. Nutritional Enrichment
- Foraging Opportunities: Allowing cattle to graze on varied pastures promotes natural foraging/grazing behaviors.
- Puzzle Feeders and Browse: Introducing hay nets, slow feeders, or hanging browse can encourage natural feeding behaviors and extend feeding time.
- Diet Variety: Offering different types of forage, grains, and supplements can prevent dietary monotony and encourage healthy eating habits.
4. Social Enrichment
- Group Housing: Cattle are social animals and thrive in group settings. Providing opportunities for social interactions, such as grooming and play, can improve their well-being.
- Mixing Ages and Types: Mixed-age groups can encourage natural social hierarchies and interactions, reducing boredom and stress.
5. Cognitive Enrichment
- Problem-Solving Tasks: Introducing simple challenges, like opening gates or finding hidden food, can stimulate cattle’s problem-solving abilities and curiosity.
- Training Sessions: Gentle handling and positive reinforcement training can enhance cattle’s cognitive engagement and strengthen human-animal bonds.
6. Occupational Enrichment
- Varied Daily Routines: Changing daily routines and activities can keep cattle mentally stimulated and prevent boredom.
- Interactive Toys: Providing large balls or other safe objects can encourage playful behaviors and physical activity.
Some of the examples of providing environmental enrichment in cattle are–
1. Health of dairy cattle is connected to lameness and skin lesions, which are markers of animal wellbeing. High producing animals need more rest (12–14 hours), which is related to the lying area that is supplied for them. In order to ruminate, cows spend the majority of their time lying down. Offering comfortable litter, such as straw, encourages lying down, which is a sign of rest and is directly tied to production.
2. Stress in cattle can be reduced by grooming. Devices that scratch or rub simulate an animal’s natural behavior and help to improve coat quality. It also aids in lowering itching-related discomfort behaviors. When a mechanical brush is available, the amount of grooming in loose-housed cattle increases.
3. The usage of EEDs can make it easier for cattle to enter a feedlot and can have an impact on how much weight they gain. The use of these is based on the proportion of animals in pens and the sort of enrichment tool being utilised. Toys consisting of plastic hose tubing, tyre fragments or chains can promote play and activity while reducing undesirable behaviour patterns.
4. Dairy animals can access body parts that are restricted when restrained while exercising. Daily activity helps animals stay healthier, suffer fewer hock injuries, and need less veterinary care.
5. A dairy animal may be stressed out by the noise. Dairy cattle require a quieter environment since they are more sensitive to sound. A variety of acoustic elements, including the human voice and other musical genres, are combined in radio stimulation, which helps dairy cows produce more milk. Additionally, music can be used as a signal to time attendance at an automated milking machine.
6. Access to meadows promotes social grooming, appropriate exercise, increased eating of roughage, and reduces stereotypical cow behaviour like tongue rolling. Additionally, it lowers the likelihood of mastitis and improves the expression of sexual behaviour in dairy animals. 7. Proof that salt or mineral licks can be used for play as well as meeting nutritional needs is provided.
8.- This kind of habitat enrichment, especially during the summer, can help to promote dairy cow wellbeing by giving them a behavioural opportunity to naturally alleviate stress.
CONCLUSION
Environmental enrichment techniques that attempt to help cattle deal with environmental stressors more effectively, avoid frustration, and promote the satisfaction of behavioural demands. The welfare of animals may be improved through enrichment techniques that address other crucial behavioural demands. Since animal welfare is defined as more than the absence of stress and harm, it also includes the development of improved affective conditions and the use of cognitive enrichment that might result in happy emotions. The use of enrichment programmes can assist dairy animals better manage environmental stressors and promote the satisfaction of their behavioural demands. Because of its physiological and behavioural consequences, abnormal behaviours may occur less frequently or with less severity.