4 Cool cow facts

The investigation of movement, activity, and behavior of animals in stables gives great insight. Read this blog to learn more about that, but also about cow behavior in paddocks.

Published on

Thu 11 Feb. 2016

Topics

| Cows | Farm Animals | Tracking | TrackLab |

4 Cool cow facts

The investigation of movement, activity, and behavior of animals in pens or stables gives great insight into differences between group and individual housing, enriched and plain stables, different types of feeding systems, and so on. Read this blog to learn more about that, but also about cow behavior in paddocks.

Cool facts about cows and cow behavior

1) Balanced diet for calves

Calves, whether raised for milk or meat production, are typically fed diets that differ from diets of feral cattle herds. For example, veal calves receive large quantities of milk replacer and solid feed with little structure to chew on, while dairy calves are weaned off milk early on and receive mostly solid feed.

Diets typically fed to calves can cause a number of welfare problems, including poor stomach health as well as stress due to the inability to perform highly-motivated natural behaviors such as rumination or sucking on a teat. Furthermore, there is much research indicating that animals, and in particular ruminants, are able to select a balanced diet and maximize their comfort. So why not let calves choose?








RESOURCES: Read more about TrackLab

Find out how TrackLab is used in a wide range of studies and how it can elevate your research!

  • Free white papers and case studies
  • Customer success stories
  • Recent blog posts

2) Standing cows

There are now advanced tracking techniques available which will enable researchers to get more detailed information about exactly where and how cows and other farm animals are moving, and so get even better insights into their welfare and behavior. Although at first sight this may seem a slightly odd thing to investigate, it is actually very important for animal welfare.

Read more...

3) Dutch Dairy Centre

Only recently registered as an association at the Chamber of Commerce, the Dutch Dairy Centre [1] is already growing into an important network of companies based in the Netherlands. Companies supply a wide range of products and services to the international dairy industry for farmers, farmer co-operatives and milk factories. The members can also work together for you as a group or in a consortium.

Supermarket consumer behavior woman female child boy milk dairy

Why the Netherlands? Well, according to the popular blog Stuff Dutch People Like [2], Dutch people like milk products a lot and consume as many as 14,3 kilos of cheese per person/year and the Dutch produce 650,000,000 kilos of cheese every year!

Read more...

References

  1.  http://www.dutchdairycentre.com/  
  2. http://stuffdutchpeoplelike.com/2010/12/03/24-dairy/

Related Posts

High-throughput screening of beneficial insects
20 Sep animal behavior research Other (Animal)

High-throughput screening of beneficial insects

Jessica de Bruijn used EntoLab for automated high-throughput screening of parasitic wasps in individual olfactory 2-choice tests. Various behavioral parameters were measured to compute a memory retention index.
Picky cats and tasty food – sniffing is an indicator for tastiness
20 Nov animal behavior research Other (Animal)

Picky cats and tasty food – sniffing is an indicator for tastiness

Cats can be extremely picky when it comes to food. If the cat doesn’t like it, it will refuse to eat. Reason enough for the pet food industry to try to find out what cats really like.
Observing monkey behavior – cracking the nut
16 Apr animal behavior research Other (Animal)

Observing monkey behavior – cracking the nut

We already know some monkeys display above average intelligence. One way by which we can tell is their use of tools. Studies have shown that capuchin monkeys use boulders and logs as anvils upon which they can crush nuts.