OIE (World Animal Health) Meeting in Bali - Prof. Nat Waran speaks on Animal Welfare

Encouraging and supporting the development of Regional Animal Welfare Strategies and Capability in Asia, the East and Oceania.

Former Director of the JMICAWE, Prof Nat Waran was invited to present on One Welfare at the recent OIE (World Animal Health) Regional Animal Welfare meeting in Bali, hosted by the Indonesian Government. The meeting attended by more than 25 National Animal Welfare Focal Point representatives from across a very large region was a great opportunity to provide information about the importance of linking improved animal welfare with positive human health and welfare outcomes using examples drawn from the work carried out by the JMICAWE and partners in different parts of the world. Discussions on the development and implementation of the OIE animal welfare codes and standards as well as support for the development of in-country animal welfare strategies took place over a three day period, and the complexity of driving forward changes to improve animal welfare across the region was made obvious to all.  

Chinese Veterinary Medicine Association Conference - Professor Nat Waran

Equine Welfare on the Agenda at the Chinese Veterinary Medicine Association Conference in Nanjing

Prof Nat Waran delivering talks on equine welfare

Promotion of an understanding of the importance of providing a Good Quality of Life for equids in China was high on the agenda for former JMICAWE Director, Professor Nat Waran who was an invited speaker at the recent Chinese Veterinary Medicine Association’s annual conference in Nanjing. The conference attracted a significant audience of Chinese equine veterinarians who were provided with information about practically assessing and managing equine welfare. 

Prof Nat along with Chris Riggs, the Hong Kong Jockey Club’s Head of Veterinary services in mainland China, and Roly Owers, CEO for the World Horse Welfare – noted that this was the first time invited equine welfare talks were integrated within the equine veterinary medicine session - a positive advance for mainstreaming animal welfare.

The Group housing facility for teaching horses at NAU.

Whilst there the group of equine welfare experts were asked to visit and comment on the proposed new equine teaching facility for veterinary students training at the Nanjing Agricultural University.
It was interesting and heartening to see the group housing facility that had been built where horses have free access to different outdoor and sheltered areas, with many behavioural opportunities. Having previously provided animal welfare professional development workshops with the NAU veterinary staff, it was good to see the JMICAWE work having a real impact on the way in which teaching animals are being managed.

Veterinary Nurses Day - Guest Speaker Hayley Walters

Veterinary nurse (VN) Hayley Walters was invited to speak at VN day in London recently to the newly qualified VNs graduating that day.

As a previous Golden Jubilee award winner, Hayley was asked by The Royal college of Veterinary Surgeons (RCVS) to give a 15 minute presentation to showcase what a VN can do and help inspire them as they start their careers.

Hayley qualified in 1999 from a mixed animal practice in Derbyshire and since then has worked with bears in China and dogs in Bosnia; taught in vet schools in Sri Lanka and Vietnam; taught final year vet students on their anaesthesia rotation in The Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies, examined students in their practical exams and created free online teaching resources used all over the world.

“Veterinary nursing has come a long way since I qualified 20 years ago. The aim of the talk was to help demonstrate to these new VNs that there is so much you can do with your career now. If you want to stay in general practice then that is fine but if you want to be an army VN, go into research, teach, work for an animal welfare charity, or specialise in referral, then that is all possible now. And since the British VN qualification is well respected all over the world, there is a lot of opportunity to work overseas too. Not many jobs offer this much diversity!”

Hayley received very positive feedback and was approached by many of the new veterinary nurses afterwards who had aspirations to progress their career.

A donation to a charity of Hayley’s choice was given by the RCVS in return for her talking. Hayley chose Dogstar Foundation; a high welfare catch, neuter, vaccinate, return project for free roaming dogs in Sri Lanka.

Animal Welfare Day 2019

Exploring Animal Sentience for World Animal Day 

World Animal Day falls on 4^th October each year and its purpose is to improve animal welfare standards around the globe, through celebrating the lives of animals. The mission of World Animal Day is to make the world a better place for animals, which fits very well with the JMICAWE mission and aims. Every two years, with our partner SRUC, JMICAWE have been involved in helping to organise an event around this date, to celebrate animal welfare. This year, we also linked up with our BioResearch vets to cover animals used in science as well as other animals. As our theme this year we focused on ‘Animal sentience and emotions’ and why that is so important in our thinking about animal welfare. We were delighted to be able to welcome 200 staff and students from local campuses to the event.

We began with a morning of talks from researchers from SRUC, the French research institute (INRA) and University of Newcastle. Our first speaker, Professor Francoise Wemelsfelder from SRUC, reminded us about animal ethics and why sentience and emotions should be at the forefront of our thinking and assessments of animal welfare. Next Professor Marie Haskell (SRUC) showed us the fascinating abilities of farm animals to recognise emotions in faces, and why faces are so important for animals.

 Professor Marie Haskell (SRUC) defines emotions

We then had a series of presentations on positive emotions in animals – such as play, positive engagement, contentment and use of enrichment. Dr Belinda Vigors shared the outcomes of some of her work in exploring these concepts with farmers, and it was great to see how important farmers felt these positive emotions were to the lives of farmed animals. Professor Alistair Lawrence then expanded on the theme of positive animal welfare, including showing a wonderful video of rats engaging in hide-and-seek play with researchers – what a great thing to be able to call work! A visiting researcher, Dr Vincent Bombail from INRA, then continued this theme with a talk about tickling rats and assessing their vocal responses. Finally our morning programme ended with a talk by Dr Matt Leach of Newcastle University about the very important emotion of pain and how it can be recognised in animals.

As is becoming a tradition with these events we had a long lunch break to allow delegates to network and find out more about animal welfare research including the use of 3D video imaging to detect animal behaviour on farm, training tools for farmers on body condition scoring of cows, and a peek at the new large animal imagining facility, including MRI. For the afternoon we had a really interesting talk from about the use of animals in science from Elliott Lilley of RSPCA and concluded with a panel discussion on animal sentience and how that might affect use of animals in science. 

Overall the feedback on the event was very positive, and we look forward to organising the next one in 2021! 

New publication – cat welfare

The Jeanne Marchig International Centre for Animal Welfare Education have undertaken a research project funded by the Animal Welfare Foundation (AWF), to identify welfare issues for a number of species, including cats.

Animal welfare experts found a consensus in determining priority welfare issues for cats in the UK and identified that the key welfare issues for our domestic cats include

• behaviour issues, often experienced by cats confined to the home
• social behaviour problems 
• disease as a result of old age 
• not seeking veterinary care at an appropriate time
• poor pain management
• issues arising from specific breeding traits
• neglect and hoarding
• stray cats.

The publication highlights important areas where further research is needed, or where awareness needs to be increased, so that there is a better understanding of the potential welfare issues that can arise and what can be done to address the welfare issues.

Common welfare issues relating to behaviour can potentially be addressed by providing enrichment, such as scratching posts, toys, hiding places – an environment that supports normal cat behaviour. Social behaviour issues in cats can arise from having insufficient resources (e.g. litter trays, feed bowls) for the number of cats in a home. Cats do not like to share and need their own space and resources to live together happily.

Read the publication for further information: https://edin.ac/2oNr2RA

Rioja-Lang, F., Bacon, H., Connor, M., Dwyer, CM. (2019) Determining priority welfare issues for cats in the United Kingdom using expert consensus. Veterinary Record Open 6: e000365. doi: 10.1136/vetreco-2019-000365

If you are interested in cat behaviour we also recommend checking out our free online course in the behaviour and welfare of dogs and cats:

The Truth About Cats and Dogs (free 5 week online course)

ICAW Conference in Malta

Vet nurse Hayley Walters was invited by Dogs Trust International to speak at ICAWC (International Companion Animal Welfare Conference) in Malta this October. 229 delegates representing 101 organisations from 39 different countries attended the conference.

Hayley spoke on recognising acute and chronic pain in cats and dogs, how to measure it, and how to treat it.

“Pain can be an emotive subject and two people looking at the same animal can disagree on wether it is in pain or not. Being able to take the subjectivity out of measuring pain is important. By using validated pain scoring tools such as the ‘Glasgow Composite Pain Scale’ for acute pain in cats and dogs  and ‘Liverpool Osteoarthritis in Dogs‘ (LOAD) for chronic pain we can objectively measure how much pain an animal is experiencing, treat it accordingly and then remeasure”.

Photo credit: Richard Murgatroyd (www.richardmurgatroyd.com)

Hayley received positive feedback from many of the delegates who were working in Dog Population Management projects and rescue shelters, and was honoured to be among many prestigious animal welfare speakers.

Networking to improve lamb survival and sheep welfare

As part of an EU project, SheepNet, JMICAWE Director, Cathy Dwyer, spent four days in France at the start of September visiting farms, engaging with farmers and contributing to a seminar on improving lamb survival. This project has been running since 2016, and involves farmers, vets, researchers and other stakeholders from six EU countries (UK, Ireland, France, Spain, Italy, Romania) and Turkey. The project aims to share science and practice across the countries to improve sheep health and reduce lamb losses, and the French visit was the final workshop for the project to share the story that lies behind the project. A key part of the work has been to facilitate and translate information between countries and allow farmers to develop ideas together, as well as to engage with farmers, veterinarians and researchers from across Europe. Although this project is coming to an end in December 2019, a second project, EuroSheep, will take its place to continue the work already begun. The materials already collated as part of SheepNet are freely available through the ‘knowledge reservoir’ on the project website: www.sheepnet.network.

Overall this project has been a great example of taking animal welfare, and other research, out of the laboratory and into the field, quite literally, and engaging farmers from many different countries in improvements to animal welfare. 

ICABGEH Congress: Prof Cathy Dwyer Keynote Address

Should animal welfare be part of sustainability?

JMICAWE Director, Cathy Dwyer, argues that animal welfare is an integral part of sustainability, and cannot be ignored in a drive to reduce the cost of food production and increase productivity, in a keynote speech given at the ICABGEH congress held in Prague, Czech Republic, organised by Turkish researchers. The audience was largely vets and animal scientists from Turkey, Eastern Europe and the Balkans, plus some participants from as far afield as Thailand and Indonesia. For many, issues and concepts of animal welfare were very new and Turkish researchers in particular were keen to develop more welfare work in their country. A Czech journalist who was present will be writing a popular science article on animal welfare and
sustainability, based on Cathy’s talk, to help share these ideas.
The programme was very varied but two fascinating talks by Turkish researchers involved a discussion of the impact of transhumance on environmental and welfare issues, and how geopolitical changes are affecting the lives of these nomadic herdspeople. In addition, a very topical paper on the impact of drought in the pregnant ewe on lamb development was presented, with implications for future global changes in climate. Turkish research has also been surveying and cataloguing the living conditions and husbandry practices for cattle living in Central Anatolia. Although the work was focused on improving productivity, it revealed a significant number of welfare issues that need to be addressed.
Other keynotes at the Congress included an excellent presentation on bees by Prof Kaspar Bienefeld, the Director of the Bee Institute at the Humboldt University in Germany. The behaviour of bees may hold the key to preventing colony collapse by encouraging the natural behaviour of the bees to remove mites from infested cells in the hive. An important finding to ensure that these pollinators continue to thrive.
Cathy is keen to maintain contacts and links with Turkish and other researchers to help promote better animal welfare practices in these countries.     

Minister of Rural Affairs Visit

Scientific Evidence to support Policy Changes

Scientists from SRUC and JMICAWE were delighted to host a visit from the Scottish Government’s Minister for Rural Affairs and the Natural Environment, MSP Mairi Gougeon on 10th September. 

The Minister has responsibility for animal welfare in Scotland, and was keen to learn more about the research in animal welfare being conducted in Edinburgh. We visited the SRUC pig research centre, where more than 30 years of research into pig behaviour and welfare has been carried out. SRUC’s Prof Alistair Lawrence explained the history of pig research from the Edinburgh pig park in the 1980s, which allowed pigs to show natural behaviour in a wood on the Pentland hills, and demonstrated that pigs were still motivated to perform the same behaviours as their wild ancestors. The story continued through a programme of work to unravel the behavioural needs of sows and piglets, culminating in the designed pen for sows and piglets, PigSAFE, which allows sows the freedom to nest-build, move around the environment and interact freely with their piglets (see www.freefarrowing.org). We also discussed other ongoing pig research, such as work on preventing tail-biting, and a project to recognise emotional expression through facial recognition technology that may be able to detect happiness from the expressions in pigs faces.

Finally, we discussed work in other species, such as the development of Qualitative Behavioural Assessment in many species by Prof Francoise Wemelsfelder, and the impact of early life experience in pigs, cattle, sheep and goats. Before leaving the Minister spent time discussing the work of JMICAWE at home and abroad with Prof Cathy Dwyer.  Overall, it was great to be able to showcase the important evidence-gathering work that we do as part of our research, and look forward to many more interactions and opportunities to contribute to improving policy for high animal welfare in farmed animals.

SSPCA Conference explores the links between domestic violence, animal abuse and childhood adverse experience

The Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SSPCA) hosted a 1-day conference in Edinburgh with the University to explore the Links Partnership, which draws on research and evidence to demonstrate a link between animal abuse and poor welfare, and cycles of abuse and violence towards humans. The day involved a number of inspirational speakers, and charted the history of understanding about non-accidental injuries in animals can also be suggestive of human abuse and violence. 

Overall, the need for different agencies to work together to bring about improvements was emphasised. Alongside speakers Phil Arkow (The Links Coalition: http://nationallinkcoalition.org/), Prof Jo Williams (University of Edinburgh Department of Psychology), Paula Boyden (Dog’s Trust), Mike Flynn and Gilly Mendes Ferreira (SSPCA); JMICAWE Director Cathy Dwyer also presented some of the work of JMICAWE in tackling animal cruelty and improving animal welfare around the world. In particular, Cathy focused on cultural differences in some of the places where we work, and how education and understanding barriers to making positive changes are important to bring about animal welfare improvements. 

One of the highlights of the day was to hear more about the Animal Guardians programme that SSPCA has been developing to work with children at an early stage who are showing signs of inappropriate behaviours towards animals (https://www.scottishspca.org/education/animal-guardians/). 

Working one-to-one using a set of bespoke activities the SSPCA has been able to educate children about animal sentience, animal needs and the reasons why animal lives should be treated with respect, and has had great success in changing children’s attitudes and behaviour, and improving the lives of pet animals.  (https://www.onewelfareworld.org/).

Overall it was often a challenging day to hear of some of the cruelty that takes place towards both animals and children, but also inspiring to see so many people working to make the world a better place. This is an important example of the working of One Welfare thinking in taking an holistic approach to understanding why animal cruelty might take place, and how this can be stopped.

53rd Congress of the International Society for Applied Ethology in Bergen, Norway

The International Society for Applied Ethology held its 53^rd annual Congress in Bergen, Norway at the beginning of August. The Society has been promoting the use of animal behaviour in animal management for more than 50 years, since its beginnings in Edinburgh (as the Society of Veterinary Ethology), and has grown to become the most important annual congress for those interested in animal behaviour and welfare. The society has also been keen to expand its activities into new regions to support animal welfare activities in Asia, South America and Africa and, through the generous support of the Open Philanthropy Project, was able to bring 14 fellows to the Conference from a diverse range of countries including Sudan, Nigeria, India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, China, Tai-Wan and Colombia. As part of the activities for these participants, JMICAWE Director, Cathy Dwyer, along with fellow ISAE members: Dr Jeremy Marchant-Forde (USDA, USA), Prof Dan Weary (UBC, Canada) and Dr Laura Boyle (Teagasc, Ireland), together with ISAE Development Officer, Rebecca Sommerville (Dog’s Trust, UK), hosted a workshop before the conference began to provide the new members with essential skills in behaviour and welfare.

‘The participants were extremely enthusiastic and dedicated to learning about animal behaviour and animal welfare’ said Cathy, ‘and it was wonderful to help them work on animal welfare skills to take back to their own countries after the Congress’.

The Congress itself began with a wonderful Wood-Gush memorial lecture (held each Congress in memory of Prof David Wood-Gush, University of Edinburgh), given by Prof Emeritus Felicity Huntingford. This covered the application of fundamental biology of fish behaviour to practical and applied problems to improve fish welfare, an important and emerging area of interest. The conference covered a range of important and inspiring areas: social behaviour, behaviour and genetics, environmental enrichment, human-animal interactions and future trends in animal production, among other topics. Overall it was good to see more than 400 people contributing to different areas and problems, but all with the aim of using science to improve animal lives.    

The Congress ended with poster and travel awards, and honouring those Society members who had achieved particular awards. And the all-important handing on of the batten (or in this case the wooden ISAE logo carved by JMICAWE associate, Mike Appleby) to the next Congress organisers.  Excitingly, this will be in India for the first time, and JMICAWE will be involved in the helping with the organisation of the Scientific Programme, with an Asian flavour. Watch this space for further updates on the Congress development!

Welcome - Katherine Curnow joins our team

Hi, I’m Katherine Curnow and I am the new administrator for the JMICAWE team.

I am from New Zealand and moved to Scotland in March after previously living in Italy and Sweden. I graduated from the University of Auckland with a BA/BSc Conjoint majoring in Biology and Ancient History, so as you can tell, I enjoy different perspectives and approaches to things. Back in New Zealand I was a high school teacher and dean but after five years I wanted a change, so moved back overseas!

I have worked within the Education sector for over ten years – both for private institutions and universities – and am looking forward to being involved with such a passionate and hard-working team. I am a strong supporter of animal welfare and am looking forward to gaining further knowledge from my work.

In New Zealand, our family are whippet and greyhound rescue enthusiasts – at the moment, we have in our family a whippet who came from the Christchurch earthquakes in 2011; and an ex-racing greyhound. 

Summer School is here

It's that time of year again - the annual R(D)SVS 3 weeks international summer school which focuses on the veterinary medical experience, specifically to our international partner institutions.

This year the group visiting comprised of 12 Undergraduate veterinary medical students ranging from 1^st-4^th year all coming from China Agricultural College (CAU) which Jess (Veterinary Nurse) had the pleasure of visiting with Cathy Dwyer (Director) in 2017.

Jess gave a talk about behaviours recognitions of dogs and cats and what we can do to improve their experience in the clinic through appropriate handling. Then we went in to the clinical skills lab to practice low stress handling on the models (shown in the photo on the left), we have available for student teaching, before moving on to discuss the behaviour of resident Labrador Seil and how we would remove her form her kennel safely. There was much hilarity when Seil decided to show off her agility skills and jump on the table to wait for her treat!

The student group will be moving on to spend time in the hospital for small animals (HfSA) next week and Jess will be responsible for showing them around the anaesthesia area and discussing inpatient management for two days.

Sheep, ostrich and giraffes in South Africa

Just some of the animals encountered when JMICAWE Director, Cathy Dwyer, attended the South African Society for Animal Science 51^st Congress in Bloemfontein, South Africa. Cathy was a guest of the animal science department at University of the Free State, and gave a plenary presentation entitled ‘Can animal welfare contribute to improved livestock productivity?’ to an audience of approximately 300 South African researchers, lecturers and students. The overall theme of the congress was ‘Managing the ecological footprint of livestock through efficient production’ and Cathy explained how poor animal welfare can contribute to poor production efficiency through impacts on neonatal mortality, disease and failing to meet animal behavioural needs.

"It is important that animal welfare is seen as an integral part of sustainable animal production, and that this is an essential component of good productivity, rather than an expensive luxury or an optional extra’ Cathy emphasised."

Cathy also gave a presentation on the welfare of sheep in the Welfare and Ethics Workshop, which gave an overview of the positive and negative welfare issues faced by sheep production, and discussed recent research in this area.  Extensive sheep production is a significant industry in South Africa but faces a number of challenges, not least high levels of predation by jackals and caracals in some areas. This was explored in more detail in a predator management workshop, with emphasis being placed on understanding predator behavioural ecology to determine when the greatest risks of livestock predation will occur. Otherwise this is ‘just killing predators’ said Prof HO de Waal, often in ways that lead to very poor welfare and suffering.

South Africa is the largest producer of ostrich products (meat, feathers and skins) in the world, and the group at Stellenbosch University are actively investigating the welfare of these very newly domesticated animals. This led to a fascinating discussion about the impact of early handling, temperament and working with potentially very dangerous animals.

Cathy was impressed by the enthusiasm and interest in animal welfare shown by participants, and plans to hold another workshop to develop research and teaching in animal welfare in South Africa are in discussion.