Innate immune responses of young bulls to a novel environment.

Animal welfare during transportation has been investigated in several studies, as opposed to post-transportation phases. In this study, we evaluated the effect of a novel environment after transportation on 26 Friesian bulls, 242 ± 42 day-old, from ten different dairy farms. Animals were shipped to a breeding center in different seasons, and selected parameters of innate immunity (serum bactericidal activity, hemolytic complement, serum albumin, α, ß, and γ-globulins, interleukin-6, TNF-α) were monitored before and after the arrival at days--4/0/4/15/30. Our results showed significant differences of IL-6 and TNF-α protein levels at destination in December (94 ± 1.3 pg/ml) and June (+788 pg/ml), respectively. Moreover, the serum levels of these cytokines increased between days 0 and 15 after the arrival, the modulation of IL-6 being in agreement with established models of physical and/or psychological stress. Concerning the modulation of albumin, alpha and beta-globulins, the highest levels were detected in April, whereas a significant decrease was observed between day 15 and 30 after arrival; on the contrary, γ-globulin levels significantly increased after day 15. The results of this study highlight the occurrence of innate immune responses of young bulls to the combined effects of climate (season) and novel farming conditions.

Searching for differences in the behavioural response of piglet groups subjected to novel situations.

The Backtest (BT), the Open Field (OF) and the Novel Object (NO) tests have been used to identify individual reaction patterns in piglets and to measure parameters that previous studies have shown to be correlated to the coping strategies of animals. The BT allows for the classification of piglets into two different "coping styles": high-resisting (HR) and low-resisting (LR), which respectively correspond to a (pro-)active and passive (or reactive) behavioural response. During previous research, the subjects were tested singularly, so the aim of this study was to investigate if differences between HR and LR animals could be detected when piglets are tested in a group using the OP and NO tests. A total of 132 piglets were subjected to the BT and then were housed in groups consisting of four individuals each so as to obtain HR pens, LR pens and mixed pens. We found differences in the pigs' behaviour during the OF and the NO tests and according to the type of group. Individual differences in the behavioural response of piglets to the Backtest were not predictive of the behavioural response of the animals subjected to the OF or to NO tests. Our results show that there are no relevant differences between HR and LR piglets when they are subjected in a group to novel situations.