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Lookup NU author(s): Professor Lucy Asher
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
Copyright: © 2024 Montalcini et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Keel bone fractures (KBF) are prevalent in commercial laying hens and are considered one of the greatest welfare concerns in the egg-production industry. While clear associations exist between KBF and animal mobility, suggesting that KBF impair mobility, the effect of mobility on KBF remains unclear. We combined data from three studies that assessed keel bone fracture severity through radiographs and monitored hens' transitions between different zones of a multi-tier aviary system (the three tiers, a littered floor, and a winter garden) the week prior to radiograph. For each hen, we extracted two daily movement behaviours: the vertical distance travelled and the mean number of zones crossed within one transition; and two daily space-use behaviours: the time spent in the top tier and the unevenness of time spent across zones. We used hierarchical Bayesian continuous time dynamic modelling to estimate how a change in a behaviour predicted a later change in keel bone fracture severity, and vice versa. Increased fracture severity did not predict later changes in space-use behaviours, but it did predict changes in movement behaviours. Specifically, increased fracture severity led to decreased vertical travelled distance and a tendency to cross more zones within one transition, suggesting impaired mobility in hens with increased fracture severity. In contrast, we found no evidence that movement or space-use behaviours predict later change in fracture severity, challenging previous literature suggesting that vertical locomotion through jumping and flying may exacerbate keel bone fractures in complex three-dimensional systems due to increased risk of collisions. However, similar efforts accounting for the location of fractures on the keel could unveil the potential influence of movement and space-use behaviours in the formation and change (healing or worsening) of KBF and increase our ability to mitigate their effects.
Author(s): Montalcini CM, Toscano MJ, Asher L, Petelle MB
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: PLoS ONE
Year: 2024
Volume: 19
Issue: 7
Online publication date: 05/07/2024
Acceptance date: 17/06/2024
Date deposited: 24/07/2024
ISSN (electronic): 1932-6203
Publisher: Public Library of Science
URL: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0306384
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0306384
Data Access Statement: The data and code for this study are available on https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/FZAVS
PubMed id: 38968298
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