This book explore theimportance of good nutrition in ensuring an adequate standard of welfare forfarm animals. It is often not realized that farm animals can suffer when theyare fed unsuitable diets, which may be because these diets are more economic orthe farmer does not know how to rectify poor nutrition. This book reveals howto recognize and deal with feeding problems for farm animals, when the animal"sbehaviour is indicating a deficiency, through oral stereotypies for example, orwhen its immune system is suppressed by dietary deficiencies. Feeding livestockin emergency situations can present special challenges, and one of life"ssimplest pleasures, the availability of water, can also be an unrecognized problemfor many farm animals. Feeding is rarely recognized for the major welfare issuethat it is. We may assume that animals in intensive husbandry conditions haveadequate feed, yet it is often too concentrated and designed primarily tomaximize production from the an
imals, in the form of growth, milk yield orreproduction. In extensive rangeland conditions adequate feed supply is oftennot assured, potentially leading to undernutrition with serious consequences for thehealth and even survival of livestock. Humans in developed countries rarelysuffer food shortages but this book will awaken concern that farm animals thereare being systematically and routinely malnourished.
Foreword (Phillips).- Introduction on welfare and nutrition (Phillips).- Hunger associated with restricted feeding systems (Tolkamp & D"Eath).- Starvation of ruminant livestock (Hogan & Phillips).- The use of feeding behaviour in the assessment of animal welfare (Nielsen, de Jong & DeVries).- Nutrition affects immune function and inflammatory responses, with implications for health and welfare (Bertoni, Trevisi, Jos, Luigi & Spiridoula).- Assessing Farm Animal Welfare from a Nutritional Perspective (Bach, von Keyserlingk, Widowski & Haley).- Integrating nutrition and animal welfare in extensive systems (Villalba, Manteca, Vercoe, Maloney & Blache).- Feeding cattle for improved productivity, health, and welfare in modern farming enterprises (Beever & Bach).- Water and the welfare of farm animals (von Keyserlingk, Nielsen, Patience & Philips).- Providing feed to livestock during emergencies (Roeder).- Animal welfare, nutrition and economics: past, present and future (Phillips & Makk
ar).