Relationship between quality of facilities, animal-based welfare indicators and measures of reproductive and productive performances on dairy farms in the northwest of Spain

Figures & data

Table 1. Objectives to be met (zero score) for the different facility-based parameters evaluated.

	Score
Area	Parameter	0	1	References
Resting	Stocking density	≤100	>100	Fregonesi, Tucker, et al. (2007)
	Quarantine pen	Yes	No	Laurence (2014)
	Calving pen	Yes	No	Vasseur et al. (2010)
	Dry bedding	Yes	No	Fregonesi, Veira, et al. (2007)
	Level bed surface	Yes	No	Drissler et al. (2005)
	Bedding maintenance	≥2	<2	Drissler et al. (2005)
	Bedding materials	Sand/straw/mattress	Rubber/concrete	Tucker and Weary (2001)
	Calcium carbonate	Yes	No	Fregonesi, Veira, et al. (2007)
	Stall width	117–127 cm.	<117/>127 cm.	Cook and Nordlund (2005); Hulsen (2007); Córdoba et al. (2012)
	Brisket broad distance from curb	178–183 cm.	<178/>183 cm.	Cook and Nordlund (2005); Anderson (2007); Hulsen (2007)
	Brisket broad height	<15 cm.	15 cm.	Cook and Nordlund (2005); Hulsen (2007); Córdoba et al. (2012)
	Total stall length	>270 cm.	≤270 cm.	Anderson (2007); Hulsen (2007); Córdoba et al. (2012)
	Neck rail distance from curb	178–183 cm.	<178/>183 cm.	Cook and Nordlund (2005); Anderson (2007); Córdoba et al. (2012)
	Neck rail height	117–127 cm.	<117/>127 cm.	Cook and Nordlund (2005); Anderson (2007); Hulsen (2007); Córdoba et al. (2012)
	Curb height	15–20 cm.	<15/>20 cm.	Anderson (2007); Córdoba et al. (2012)
Circulation	Width crossovers	≥250 cm. without water troughs ≥420 cm. with water troughs	<250 cm. without water troughs <420 cm. with water troughs	Pereira et al. (2003)
	Width fed alley	≥420 cm	<420 cm.	Pereira et al. (2003)
	Width free stall alley	≥300 cm.	<300 cm.	Pereira et al. (2003)
	Striped surface	Yes	No	Juaristi et al. (2004); Telezhenko et al. (2007)
	Rubber floor	Yes	No	Telezhenko and Bergsten (2005); Telezhenko et al. (2007); Fjeldaas et al. (2011)
	Blind alleys	No	Yes	Juaristi et al. (2004); Mülling et al. (2006)
	Slippery floor	No	Yes	Juaristi et al. (2004); Telezhenko et al. (2007)
	Slatted floor	No	Yes	Telezhenko and Bergsten (2005); Fjeldaas et al. (2011)
	Slurry pit under barn	No	Yes
	Accumulation of manure in the alley	No	Yes	Mülling et al. (2006)
Cows	Presence of ectoparasites	No	Yes	Hulsen (2007)
	Presence of flies	No	Yes	Juaristi et al. (2004); Hulsen (2007)
	Presence of cows with horns	≤1	>1	Fraser et al. (2013)
	Presence of cows with tail	Yes	No	Fraser et al. (2013)
	flight zone	≤75 cm.	>75 cm.	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Stress for a scarce commodity	No	Yes	Hulsen (2007)
	Cow crowding	No	Yes	Hulsen (2007)
	Preventive claw trimming	≥1/year	No	Lagger (2007); Cook et al. (2016)
	Footbaths	Yes	No	Lagger (2007); Cook et al. (2016)
	Welfare objects	Yes	No	Hulsen (2007)
Feeding	Feeding table smooth and clean	Yes	No	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Cleaning feeding table	≥1 /day	<1 /day	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Continuous feed availability	Yes	No	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Feeding table with shadow	Yes	No	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Feeding table covered	Yes	No	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Height from feeding table to cow foot	10–15 cm.	<10/>15 cm.	Anderson (2007); Hulsen (2007); Trillo et al. (2017)
	Water analysis	Yes	No	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Cleaning water troughs	≥1 /day	<1 /day	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Water troughs design	Flip	Flip and fixed/Only fixed	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Cm. of water troughs /cow	≥8 cm./cow	<8 cm./cow	Trillo et al. (2017)
	Water troughs at the exit of the milking parlour	Yes	No	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Width of headlocks	≥60 cm.	<60 cm.	Trillo et al. (2017)
Ventilation	Orientation	East-West	Other	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Air movement on the face of the cow	Yes, slight	No/Yes, excessive	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Condensation	No	Yes	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Ceiling insulation	Yes	No	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Sidewall height	≤4 m.	>4 m.	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Lateral opening	Yes	No	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Cow curtain	Yes	No	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Height to ridge	≥6 m.	<6 m.	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Forced ventilation systems	Yes	No	D’Emilio et al. (2017)
	Humidity	No	Yes	Juaristi et al. (2004)
	Spiderwebs (sign of poor ventilation)	No	Yes

Table 2. Scores for animal-based welfare indicators.

Variable	Levels	Description	References
Body condition score	1	Severe under conditioning	Ferguson et al. (1994)
	2	Frame obvious
	3	Frame and covering well balanced
	4	Frame not as visible and covering
	5	Severe over conditioning
Lameness score	1	Stands and walks normally with a level back. Makes long confident strides.	Sprecher et al. (1997)
	2	Stands with flat back, but arches when walks. Gait is slightly abnormal.
	3	Stands and walks with an arched back and short strides with one or more legs. Slight sinking of dewclaws in limb opposite to the affected limb may be evident.
	4	Arched back standing and walking. Favouring one or more limbs but can still bear some weight on them. Sinking of the dewclaws is evident in the limb opposite to the affected limb.
	5	Pronounced arching of back. Reluctant to move, with almost complete weight transfer off the affected limb.
Hygiene score lower leg/ udder/upper leg and flank	1	Clean, little or no evidence of manure	Cook (2002)
	2	Clean, only slight manure splashing
	3	Dirty, distinct demarcated plaques of manure
	4	Filthy, confluent plaques of manure
Hock lesions	No	Absent
	Yes	Hair loss, ulceration or swelling

Table 3. Distribution (N, %), mean size (number of lactating cows), parity and proportion of farms with outside access, within the farm groups constructed in function of facility-based scores.

Farm groups (facility-based score)	N	%	Farm size (mean ± sd)	Parity (mean ± sd)	Farms with outside access N (%)*
Top-performing farms (<21)	61	32.6	60.9 ± 36.4	2.5 ± 0.3	5 (8.2)
Group 2 (21–22)	17	9.1	60.8 ± 41.0	2.5 ± 0.4	2 (11.8)
Group 3 (23–25)	43	23.0	66.7 ± 46.9	2.5 ± 0.5	4 (9.3)
Group 4 (26–29)	38	20.3	44.8 ± 22.5	2.5 ± 0.6	6 (15.8)
Poorest-performing farms (>29)	28	15.0	35.6 ± 12.7	2.7 ± 0.5	10 (35.7)
TOTAL	187	100	55.1 ± 36.3	2.5 ± 0.5	27 (14.4)

(%)*: percentage relative to the number of farms per group.

Table 4. Animal-based welfare indicators, reproductive and productive measures (means ± sd) in the five groups of farms.

	Top-performing farms	Group 2	Group 3	Group 4	Poorest-performing farms	p Value
Body condition (%)
Suitable	57.2 ± 13.0	60.9 ± 15.7	53.0 ± 13.8	53.6 ± 19.2	52.4 ± 12.9	.224
Low	34.6 ± 14.4	31.3 ± 17.1	40.6 ± 15.7	38.1 ± 19.0	40.1 ± 16.4	.173
High	8.2 ± 6.3	7.8 ± 12.1	6.4 ± 7.1	8.3 ± 9.2	7.4 ± 8.4	.835
Lameness score (%)
1	66.6 ± 16.2	68.3 ± 13.4	64.8 ± 17.6	55.2 ± 15.8**	53.9 ± 19.5**	.001
2	23.3 ± 12.2	23.7 ± 12.0	24.9 ± 14.4	32.6 ± 13.0**	32.6 ± 14.4*	.002
3	6.4 ± 5.3	6.9 ± 5.2	7.1 ± 6.5	7.7 ± 6.6	9.6 ± 9.1	.314
4	3.0 ± 4.5	1.1 ± 1.5	2.6 ± 3.1	3.4 ± 4.4	3.5 ± 5.7	.330
5	0.7 ± 1.6	0.1 ± 0.2	0.8 ± 1.4	1.0 ± 2.7	0.3 ± 1.0	.338
Dirty cows (%)
Lower leg	79.8 ± 25.6	83.7 ± 18.8	87.2 ± 18.6	91.9 ± 8.6*	95.4 ± 6.6*	.033
Udder	30.8 ± 23.9	35.1 ± 27.4	48.9 ± 28.3**	51.3 ± 28.3**	56.0 ± 20.3**	.001
Upper leg and flank	38.1 ± 30.2	28.2 ± 22.9	42.2 ± 25.9	39.6 ± 26.3	42.8 ± 26.3	.554
Hock lesions (%)	22.2 ± 21.7	21.2 ± 18.9	17.3 ± 24.1	23.1 ± 23.0	28.7 ± 25.8	.368
Reproductive measures
Interval calving to first AI (d)	76.8 ± 11.3	84.3 ± 11.3*	81.4 ± 10.5	77.0 ± 10.3	82.5 ± 10.0	.018
Fertility in the first AI (%)	32.7 ± 8.7	33.9 ± 11.6	33.1 ± 10.9	32.7 ± 12.3	30.7 ± 11.9	.892
Interval calving to conception (d)	145.3 ± 23.5	149.4 ± 24.4	151.6 ± 22.5	150.0 ± 32.0	157.3 ± 38.5	.465
% Heat detection	56.5 ± 7.0	52.7 ± 8.9	53.1 ± 9.0	51.4 ± 9.2*	46.7 ± 8.5**	.000
Mean fertility (%)	32.7 ± 6.4	34.3 ± 8.4	34.7 ± 9.2	35.0 ± 9.7	35.6 ± 9.9	.575
Culling rate (%)	24.7 ± 9.6	21.4 ± 16.2	23.9 ± 9.3	25.3 ± 10.8	20.3 ± 11.7	.337
Productivity
L/cow/day	34.4 ± 3.8	33.7 ± 5.6	31.2 ± 5.1**	30.5 ± 4.0**	27.4 ± 2.3**	.000
L/cow/day normalised 4% fat/3.3% protein	35.3 ± 4.3	34.9 ± 5.7	32.8 ± 5.6	31.1 ± 4.3**	28.1 ± 3.6**	.000
Somatic cells (×10^3 cells/mL)	217.1 ± 62.5	264.7 ± 119.3	225.2 ± 81.1	264.2 ± 110.9	244.9 ± 90.7	.114
% Fat	3.8 ± 0.8	3.8 ± 0.6	3.9 ± 0.5	3.7 ± 0.3	3.6 ± 0.9	.556
% Protein	3.3 ± 0.1	3.3 ± 0.1	3.3 ± 0.1	3.3 ± 0.1	3.3 ± 0.2	.997

*p < .05 and **p < .01: for comparison with top-performing farms.

Table 5. Proportions (expressed as percentages) of the top-performing and poorest-performing farms that met the objectives established for the facility-based measures evaluated.

Area	Parameter	Top-performing farms (n = 61) %	Poorest-performing farms (n = 28) %	p Value
Resting	Stocking density	72.1	57.1	.124
	Quarantine pen	23.0	10.7	.141
	Calving pen	77.0	46.4	.005
	Dry bedding	90.2	42.9	.000
	Level bed surface	88.5	57.1	.001
	Bedding maintenance	95.1	53.6	.000
	Bedding materials	67.2	28.6	.001
	Calcium carbonate	70.5	35.7	.002
	Stall width	50.8	14.3	.001
	Brisket broad distance from curb	29.5	21.4	.299
	Brisket broad height	26.2	46.4	.051
	Total stall length	9.8	7.1	.512
	Neck rail distance from curb	8.2	14.3	.297
	Neck rail height	37.7	28.6	.276
	Curb height	24.6	10.7	.107
Alley	Width crossovers	9.8	25.0	.063
	Width fed alley	62.3	7.1	.000
	Width free stall alley	70.5	17.9	.000
	Striped surface	91.8	21.4	.000
	Rubber floor	8.2	0.0	.143
	Blind alleys	60.7	25.0	.002
	Slipping floor	95.1	28.6	.000
	Slatted floor	95.1	25.0	.000
	Slurry pit under barn	100.0	53.6	.000
	Manure accumulation in the alley	98.4	67.9	.000
Cows	Presence of ectoparasites	78.7	64.3	.120
	Presence of flies	95.1	89.3	.278
	Presence of cows with horns	44.3	21.4	.031
	Presence of cows with tail	93.4	78.6	.048
	Flight zone	95.1	82.1	.061
	Stress for a scarce commodity	95.1	57.1	.000
	Cow crowding	91.8	71.4	.016
	Preventive claw trimming	73.8	46.4	.012
	Footbaths	93.4	57.1	.000
	Welfare objects	52.5	78.6	.016
Feeding	Feeding table smooth and clean	45.9	3.6	.000
	Cleaning feeding table	100.0	96.4	.315
	Continuous feed availability	100.0	96.4	.315
	Feeding table with shadow	73.8	50.0	.026
	Feeding table covered	100.0	92.9	.097
	Height from feeding table to cow foot	50.8	28.6	.040
	Water analysis	93.4	92.9	.618
	Cleaning water troughs	50.8	7.1	.000
	Water troughs design	78.7	14.3	.000
	Cm. of water troughs /cow	73.8	57.1	.094
	Water troughs at the exit of the parlour	75.6	32.1	.003
	Width headlocks	82.0	60.7	.031
Ventilation	Orientation	31.1	35.7	.423
	Air movement on the face of the cow	91.8	75.0	.038
	Condensation	98.4	50.0	.000
	Ceiling insulation	21.3	0.0	.005
	Sidewall height	91.8	46.4	.000
	Lateral opening	95.1	39.3	.000
	Cow curtain	41.0	0.0	.000
	Height to ridge	98.4	71.4	.000
	Forced ventilation systems	31.1	7.1	.010
	Humidity	100.0	67.9	.000
	Spider webs	96.7	35.7	.000

Parameters and numbers shown in bold type indicate significant differences between the two farm groups.

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