Yolande Seddon

University of Saskatchewan | U of S · Department of Large Animal Clinical Sciences

Play behaviour has been suggested to be inherently rewarding for animals, inducing positive emotional states. The psychophysiological effect of emotions can be assessed through heart rate variability (HRV), serving as a proxy measure of sympathovagal balance. This study investigated how the performance of play influences heart rate (HR) and HRV par...

Positive emotions can reduce disease susceptibility during infectious challenges in humans, and emerging evidence suggests similar effects in farm animals. Because play behaviour may support a positive emotional state in pigs, this study investigates whether rearing pigs with regular intermittent play opportunities enhances disease resilience when...

Ninety Angus × Hereford steers (259.9 ± 36.18 kg body weight (BW)), were used in a 56-d experiment to assess the effects of flavoring additives on feed intake, and stress and immune response of newly received feedlot cattle. Steers were homogenously distributed by BW into six pens equipped with an individual feed intake monitoring system, and pen w...

Cortisol and dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) are circulating adrenal hormones whose concentration in the blood varies in the face of infectious and non-infectious stressors. Their incorporation into hair makes their concentration in hair a robust retrospective assessment of HPA-axis activity as a measure of the stress response of an animal over the p...

In the development and implementation of housing systems for pigs, there has been a significant focus on pig welfare including loose housing of lactating sows either indoors or outdoors. However, it is equally important to consider the environmental and economic aspects of housing systems to ensure sustainability in livestock production. The aim of...

North American swine producers commonly transport piglets away from sow farms at weaning. However, limited information on factors associated with piglet mortality during these transports is available. The objectives of this study were to identify transport characteristics that were associated with the occurrence of in-transit mortality (≥1 piglet f...

Objective: Describe concentrations of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) detectable in piglet sera before and after road transport, and evaluate the correlation of serum BDNF with other physiological parameters used to assess swine welfare. Animals: Commercial crosses of piglets that underwent weaning and transport at approximately 3 wk of...

Canadian transport practices for shipments of newly weaned piglets are not well-described despite documentation requirements for those conducting the movement of these animals. The objective of this study was to describe the characteristics of weaned piglet transport events that occurred between 2014 and 2018 using records provided by five Canadian...

The purpose of this study was to explore plasma metabolite levels in young healthy pigs and their potential association with disease resilience and estimate genetic and phenotypic correlation with the change in lymphocyte concentration following disease challenge. Plasma samples were collected from 968 healthy nursery pigs over 15 batches at an ave...

The impact of transport on weaned piglet welfare has been evaluated under experimental conditions, but data generated from studies conducted under commercial conditions and incorporating variation in time between weaning and transport are lacking. The purpose of this research was to describe the behaviour patterns, changes in weight and signs of in...

In Canada, the 2014 Code of Practice for the Care and Handling of Pigs proposed the continued operation of existing stall barns after 2024 on condition that bred sows be given access to periodic exercise. Therefore, this study evaluated the effects of periodic exercise on sow welfare. Sows (n = 180) were assigned to one of three treatments: stall-h...

The 2014 Canadian Pig Code of Practice includes a recommendation to provide stall-housed gestating pigs with periodic exercise. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of periodic exercise on sow performance and placental and piglet characteristics. Sows (n = 180) were assigned to one of three gestation treatments: stall-housed sows...

The welfare of stall-housed gestating sows is a point of public concern worldwide. In Canada, the Code of Practice for the Care and Handling of Pigs (2014) proposed allowing the operation of existing stall barns after 2024, if bred female pigs are given opportunities for greater freedom of movement. Previous research demonstrated that sows are moti...

The effect of washing procedure and contamination level on the concentrations of cortisol and dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) in swine hair was explored over two studies. Hair shaved from finisher pigs (n = 8) and sows (n = 8, cortisol study 1 only) was split into two treatments (two hair samples/pig) to receive either three isopropanol or methanol w...

Observational studies describing the impact of transport duration on weaned piglet welfare are limited. Current Canadian transport regulations are heavily informed by studies involving market hogs. Due to physiological differences between weaned piglets and market hogs, additional data on their response to transport are needed for age-specific evid...

Despite being phased out in the EU, several states in the USA and other select countries such as Australia, gestation stalls remains a common sow housing system worldwide. In Canada, the 2014 Code of Practice for the Care and Handling of Pigs permits the operation of existing stall barns, provided that bred female pigs are given opportunities for a...

The objective of the study was to determine hair cortisol concentrations in sows in two different housing systems. Sows (n = 66, parity 0–6) were housed at the SDSU sow facility and assigned to one of two housing systems, stalls (STL) or group pens (PEN). The STL sows (n = 34) were housed in gestation stalls from breeding until d111 ± 1.1 of gestat...

This chapter reviews developmental influences on pig behaviour. It begins by discussing prenatal environmental effects on development of pig behaviour, focusing on aspects such as pre-conception and post-conception environments on offspring and piglet behaviour. It also touches on prenatal housing conditions, maternal nutrition, heat stress, infect...

Ninety steers (259.9 ± 36.18 kg BW) were used in a 56-d experiment to assess the effects of flavoring additives on feeding behavior, feed efficiency, growth performance, and temperament of newly arrived feedlot cattle. Steers were homogenously distributed by BW into six pens (15 head/pen) and pen was randomly assigned to one of 3 treatments (2 pens...

The goal of this study was to identify practical enrichments for sows in partially or fully slatted pen systems. Four treatments were applied: (1) Constant: constant provision of wood on chain; (2) Rotate: rotation of rope, straw and wood enrichments; (3) Stimulus: rotation of enrichments (as in Rotate) with an associative stimulus (bell or whistle...

Severe shoulder lesions in sows are manifested as ulcers comparable to pressure ulcers in humans. In sows, shoulder lesions appear on the skin overlying the bony prominence of the scapula, and are most commonly observed in the first weeks of lactation. Shoulder ulcers arise due to prolonged compression of blood vessels around the tuber of the scapu...

The psychological disturbance caused to pigs at loading is thought to be responsible for increased difficulty in handling and impaired well-being through associated rough handling and injury (Geverink et al ., 1998). Environmental enrichment (toys and driving) has been shown to reduce the force required and the excitability of pigs driven through a...

The objectives were to (1) investigate the effectiveness of hair cortisol concentration (HCC) as a measure of long-term stress in beef cattle and (2) determine whether meloxicam would decrease postcastration stress. Bull calves on two farms [site 1: Hereford cross (n = 73); site 2: Black Angus (n = 85)] were assigned to three treatments: (1) surgic...

The authors would like to add that “Sebastien Goumon was supported by Grant No MZERO0716 from the Czech Ministry of Agriculture” in the Acknowledgement Section of their paper published in Animals [...]

Oral sucrose was evaluated for its ability to reduce pain following castration. Piglets (n = 126) were assigned to one of the five treatments: (1) castrated and given 3 mL of water (C); (2) castrated with 3 mL of 30% sucrose before castration (SucB); (3) castrated and given 3 mL of 30% sucrose after castration (SucA); (4) sham castrated and given 3...

The objective of this study was to assess the effects of the season, travel duration and trailer compartment location on blood creatine-kinase (CK), lactate and cortisol concentrations in 384 pigs and assess their relationships with trailer temperature, heart rate and gastrointestinal tract temperature (GTT), behavior, carcass damage scores and mea...

Abstract: The objective of this study was to assess the effects of the season, travel duration and trailer compartment location on blood creatine-kinase (CK), lactate and cortisol concentrations in 384 pigs and assess their relationships with trailer temperature, heart rate and gastrointestinal tract temperature (GTT), behavior, carcass damage scor...

Can we improve the health and welfare of livestock while increasing production? Can we maintain animal biodiversity in the face of increasing demands for resources and expanding agriculture? Can we use animal behaviour to reduce the carbon footprint of livestock production? Applied ethology is a young, multidisciplinary science that is relevant to...

A novel behavioural test using a handling chute was evaluated over two trials as an objective method to assess pain in piglets following castration. Piglet (n = 98) navigation time (NT) through a handling chute was measured at specific time points up to 24 h post treatment. In trial 1, comparing the NT of castrates (C) and sham castrates (SC), C pi...

This technical note describes the development of a novel spreadsheet-based financial simulation model that estimates the cost of pig production in five free-farrowing systems in comparison to standard sow housing in a farrowing crate. The model was developed to address the recognised deficiency in financial information on free-farrowing systems, an...

The majority of indoor sows in the UK (around 95 per cent) farrow in conventional farrowing crates. There is pressure from a number of quarters – EU and national regulators, supermarket buyers and consumers – to improve the welfare of sows by adopting ''free'' farrowing systems. A DEFRA-funded project (under the acronym PigSAFE) conducted by Newcas...

New livestock housing systems designed to improve animal welfare will only see large-scale commercial adoption if they improve profitability, or are at least cost neutral to the farm business. Economic evaluation of new system developments is therefore essential to determine their effect on cost of production and hence the extent of any market prem...

The effective use of pooled oral fluid (OF) in disease surveillance requires that samples are representative of the group. The aim of this study was to develop a 'rope presentation' protocol to maximise the number of different pigs sampled from a pen of animals. Eight pens of grower pigs in 'fully slatted' accommodation (FS) and 'straw-kennels' (SK...