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Aggressive behaviour Many animals in the bio-industry
are with many other animals all day long , in small pens, in the dark.
They are very bored. So it sometimes happenes that they become aggressive
towards one another. Cannibalism occurs especialily in cases of pigs
and chickens, because they are always kept with more than one in
a sty.
Pigs Pigs for instance sometimes nibble one another's tails. That’s complete normal behaviour and mostly not painful. But in sties, it can happen that they chew in staid of nibble, so they hurt each other. Sometimes the tails are completely chewed off. Also the ears too are not unhurt . Some animals change into real hunters, who make a few victims alone or in groups . Those victims are sometimes almost eaten alive. Sometimes a sow will nibble or eat her piglets or the piglets will eat into their mother. It would be logical that the farmer would remove these mutilated animals, but more as 1% from the supply to the slaughterhouses consist of so-called wrecks. The measures that can be taken for this kind of cannibalism are usally very simple. A very practical solution is cutting off the tail and ears, but that is painful. That's why scientists consider changing the living conditions. For instance they discovered
that pigs in sties with straw hardly ever nibble on their fellows' tails.
Farmers do not often use straw, because they think you need a lot of straw,
bot they discovered 100 gram is enough. Further it was found that light
has influence too. When you turn off the lights in the sties the pigs become
very tens and assume in a position of distress,What was most striking was
the lack of any social contact. Putting staw in the resting places
help prevent the leg injuries that are so common
Chickens Chickens have a hard time as
well. The natural behaviour for a chicken is searching for a nesting
place, making a shallow hole, gather some soft covering, lay a few eggs,
wait a moment, check the eggs with their bills and leave the nest,
But that’s different when chickens are with about 4 other chickens in a
battery. Instead of searching a nest you can observe cries of terror, utter
some fearfull sound, making motions and push other chickens aside. They
put their head and neck through the bars and push their body forwards.
After that the hens lay their eggs reasonably quietly. There isn’t any
time to check the eggs, because the eggs have already left the cage. After
this the chicken is completely exhausted.
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Pig with little pigs |
