Complementary and alternative veterinary medicine (CAVM) is becoming increasingly popular in equine medicine. While specific CAVM methods may have beneficial effects for certain indications, the scientific evidence for many other methods remains limited or is lacking. Potential animal welfare concerns may arise when, as in Germany, a lack of legal regulation allows individuals with varying levels of qualification to offer treatments without standardised professional requirements. The aim of this study was to assess the use of non-veterinary therapists in the equine sector in Germany and to identify possible implications relevant to animal welfare. As part of a large-scale online survey (n = 7,723 evaluable datasets), horse owners with and without a veterinary background as well as practising equine veterinarians were surveyed. The results show that over 80% of non-veterinarian horse owners reported having at least one other equine therapist for their horses besides a veterinarian. Osteopaths, physiotherapists and chiropractors were consulted most frequently. According to the respondents, the majority of therapists in most of the therapeutic professions assessed were not veterinarians. More than half of the equine veterinarians surveyed also reported that, since the amendment of the German Veterinary Fee Schedule (Gebührenordnung für Tierärztinnen und Tierärzte; GOT) in 2022, they more frequently encountered cases in which non-veterinary therapists had treated horses before veterinary care was sought. From an animal welfare perspective, these findings must be assessed critically. The combination of a lack of legal regulation of non-veterinary medical professions, economic pressure on animal owners, and increasing therapeutic diversity carries the risk of delayed or inadequate medical care. To ensure animal welfare, clear legal regulations, binding qualification requirements, and greater awareness among animal owners of their legal responsibilities are essential.

A common ethical view, widely reflected in legislation, accepts duties of care for domesticated animals under human control, but does not extend such duties to free-living wild animals. This paper addresses the question of what is owed to a group of animals that falls between these two groups, i.e. feral animals that have domesticated origins, but that now live largely independently. We discuss the question in light of two contentious cases: feral horses on Sable Island in Canada and Soay sheep on the island of Hirta in the Scottish Hebrides. Both populations are located on resource-restricted islands with periodic severe challenges to food supply. These challenges have led to significant ethical disagreement about whether to treat the animals as wild and leave them alone, or to accept duties of care by providing supplementary food or controlling population size to reduce suffering. For the Soay sheep, and to some extent for the Sable Island horses, the debate seems to centre around whether they are perceived to be wild or domestic animals. We argue that management of feral animals should consider more than the assigned domestic or wild ‘status’ of the animals and seek to engage stakeholders in making decisions based on multiple and, to some degree, competing values, including animal welfare, wildness, biodiversity, and other conservation values.

Contemporary animal welfare science emphasises the roles of challenge, skill development and skill expression in positive animal welfare, and takes a dynamic, temporal view of affect. However, cognitive enrichment as a welfare intervention (CE originally defined by Clark 2011 and later termed CEwelfare by Clark 2022) has largely focused on how challenge impacts welfare at a general activity budget level, rather than evidence of skill development and coping during challenge. This paper aims to realign CE with the current views of challenge and animal welfare, by proposing an updated CE definition and a new methodological approach. CE arises when an animal is challenged to develop and express its evolved cognitive skills, and the process or outcome of coping with challenge is associated with a net positive affective state. We argue that rule-scaffolded play (gameplay) could be a powerful subtype of CE, because games offer skill development opportunities similar to the Zone of Proximal Development in humans. Gameplay unfolds as a sequence of events, allowing us to explore how cognitive performance is temporally linked to emotional expression. We describe two broad types of CE game – Innovation and Flow – that feature relatively lower and higher rule scaffolding, respectively. We also discuss the role of frustration in CE; initial frustration is normal when animals encounter a challenge, but a Flow game aims to avoid ongoing boredom and frustration by maintaining a skill-challenge balance. We end by presenting a case study of a Flow game for marine mammals in a zoological setting.

Aggression is one of the most serious hazards to the welfare of captive animals, with the potential to cause pain, injury, and mortality. Physical enrichment (PE), defined as the provision of physical structures and objects such as shelters, is widely used to improve welfare, yet it can also facilitate aggression by creating defendable resources. This perspective integrates insights from behavioural ecology and animal welfare science to develop a conceptual framework for understanding how PE shapes aggression and well-being in captive animals. We propose that combining resource defence theory with detailed behavioural analysis provides a powerful tool to interpret how PE influences the expression of aggression and how it is distributed among performers and recipients within the group. We identify mechanisms through which specific attributes of enrichment (complexity, distribution, size, materials used, placement) may mitigate adverse welfare outcomes, including reducing contest intensity, providing opportunities for conflict avoidance, and diverting behavioural motivation away from direct competition. We conclude by proposing targeted experimental approaches to isolate the effect of specific enrichment attributes on behaviour and welfare. Applying this framework can inform the design of enrichment strategies that enable animals to express natural behaviours, including aggression, while minimising negative welfare outcomes.

A Delphi survey was used as part of a process to identify priority animal-based welfare measures as a starting point for developing a future dairy cattle welfare assessment framework for Indonesian dairy farms. Two rounds of an e-survey were used to reach a consensus of expert opinion from four organisations associated with dairy cattle welfare in Indonesia. Sixty-three respondents were identified as ‘experts’ and sent Delphi survey 1, which asked them to list, for Indonesian dairy farms, three key welfare problems and six animal-based welfare measures that could be used to identify those problems. The 47 experts who responded to survey 1 identified 54 different welfare problems and 83 different animal-based measures. In the follow-up Delphi survey 2, 44 experts rated the importance (5-point scale) of each of the 83 measures and ranked their five most important measures. Based on the importance score, a final consensus set of 20 animal-based measures was produced after checking for duplication. This set of measures was weighted towards negative health effects, likely due to the dominance of veterinarians in the panel, highlighting a prioritisation bias in Indonesian veterinarians’ thinking towards negative health effects rather than behavioural and positive welfare. Lameness, mastitis, and heat stress were the key health and welfare issues highlighted by the panellists. These surveys have identified potential measures supporting the development of a framework to address priority welfare problems on Indonesian smallholder dairy farms. However, a wider perspective on welfare priorities in Indonesian cattle is needed before the protocol is finalised.

There is limited information on the slaughter systems employed by small-scale poultry producer/processors in the UK. This study aimed to evaluate these systems through: (1) a survey of slaughter practices used by small-scale UK producer/processors; and (2) an experimental assessment of stunning effectiveness in turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo domesticus) using the three most commonly reported head-only electrode configurations. A survey of 20 poultry and waterfowl producer/processors revealed substantial variation in stunning equipment, electrode design and reported electrical parameters. Constant-voltage systems predominated, and many respondents were unable to report the current, voltage or frequency used. Four producer/processors reported operating below the legal minimum current for turkeys (400 mA), and a range of electrode types was identified, with the three most reported tested in the experimental study. In the experimental study, 39 ex-breeding turkeys were stunned with a commercially available constant voltage (50 Hz AC sinusoidal waveform) head-only electrical stunner using single-pin, needle-pin or three-pin electrodes. Stunning effectiveness was assessed using recorded electrical parameters, current profiles, behavioural and brainstem indicators, and time to return of visual evoked potentials (VEPs). Needle-pin and three-pin electrodes produced higher peak currents and shorter times to peak current than single-pin electrodes. VEPs were initially abolished immediately after all stuns but returned earliest with single pin (12.0 [± 2.7] s, range: 5.4–24.0 s), and needle pin electrodes (15.0 [± 2.6] s, range: 4.8–35.4 s). Return of VEPs was delayed significantly longest with three-pin electrodes (26.0 [± 2.6] s, range: 13.8–52.8 s) compared to the other electrode types. There was no significant difference between treatments in time to return of rhythmic breathing or nictitating membrane reflexes. In conclusion, these findings suggest that constant-voltage head-only stunning systems may not reliably prevent recovery before or during exsanguination, although three-pin electrodes performed better than the alternatives.

Restricted milk feeding is a critical welfare concern in dairy production. Automated milk feeders (AMF) may help farms provide appropriate milk rations without adding to the workload. Our study aimed to understand how the use of AMF affects milk-feeding conditions and work practices important for calf welfare, as well as the work and social lives of dairy farmers and farm staff. We conducted one focus group interview and 11 semi-structured interviews with owners or staff on 14 Swedish AMF dairy farms. Interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. We identified six themes that describe participants’ experiences of using AMF: Calf welfare, Onboarding the calf, Disease transmission and detection, Managing the AMF, Task and time allocation, and Experience of work and work engagement. Although participants generally reported a sense of vulnerability in the event of failure and dissatisfaction with the distributor’s service, they were overall highly satisfied with the system. Our findings indicate that AMF use can overcome an important barrier to achieving higher milk allowances by enabling more frequent milk meals with reduced labour and ensuring that calves do not experience prolonged hunger. Based on our findings, we suggest that if the main challenges for calves (disease transmission and competition) and people (technology management and disease detection) are sufficiently addressed, AMF can improve calf welfare and social sustainability in dairy calf care.

People working directly on animal farms arguably have the most influence over their animals’ welfare. Farm-workers’ perspectives and knowledge of animal welfare affect their ability to meet the needs of animals and to address concerns related to animal welfare as they arise. This study investigates the perspectives of people working on broiler chicken farms in West Java, Indonesia. Thirty-eight participants consisting of owners and related staff completed a survey that comprised of 52 questions and that targeted four key topics. These topics were pain in chickens, knowledge of animal welfare, ability to identify welfare concerns in broiler chickens, and knowledge of welfare indicators in broiler chickens. A second survey investigated concerns of broiler chicken farm managers, by surveying 14 farm managers in West Java. Results revealed that all participants believe chickens can feel pain, and most believe that chickens are sentient. Sixty-five percent of the participants stated they understood the concept of animal welfare, and knowledge of animal welfare was significantly correlated with education level. Key concerns about broiler chicken farming were extreme weather resulting in difficulty sourcing clean water and rice husks for litter, and disease. Lack of procedures for culling sick and injured birds was also a significant welfare concern.

The 3Rs (namely, Replacement, Reduction, and Refinement) and harm-benefit analysis (HBA) are central to the evaluation procedures regulating the use of animals in biomedical research. These deeply intertwined frameworks frequently overlap conceptually and are often confused. This paper examines whether these frameworks are grounded in the same moral factors to descriptively investigate the normative functions attributed to them in recent publications and in Directive 2010/63/EU. To this end, the strategies for operationalising the 3Rs and HBA were examined to infer the ethical issues researchers typically face by identifying and clustering the most recurring themes and arguments mentioned in the literature. This conceptual ‘unpacking’ process concludes that the moral factors underpinning both frameworks centre on two main normative anchorage points: the Animal and Epistemological foci. A set of normative, operational criteria relevant to ethics committees when assessing research project proposals was also developed.

The welfare issues associated with water-bath stunning, particularly inversion and shackling, are widely recognised. This study aimed to develop, optimise and evaluate a prototype upright restraint system for broilers that avoids inversion and shackling of conscious birds. The device consisted of a horizontal conveyor with paired vertical side-belts fitted with rubber fingers to conform to the bird’s body, restraining the bird and preventing flapping. Fifty slaughter-weight broilers (1.7–3.6 kg) underwent up to five restraint runs each while behavioural indicators of distress, discomfort, trauma and positioning outcomes were assessed. Iterative design changes improved presentation, moving the side-belts closer, increased the odds of normal-like rhythmic breathing and removing the top finger row reduced head withdrawal. There were no overt signs of severe distress or trauma; however, vocalisations increased with run number. Repeated exposure may have influenced responses through habituation or sensitisation. However, in commercial use, birds would enter the device only once to be stunned and bled, so multi-run observations should not be over-generalised to slaughter conditions. These findings support the proof of concept for upright restraint as an improved welfare alternative compared to inversion-based systems for broilers.

The welfare of companion animals in the UK is protected by legislation. Despite this protection, concerns exist about the provision of appropriate care for animals by owners and the resulting detrimental impact on welfare. Many concerns are linked to a lack of knowledge of the needs of companion animals and the action or inaction of their owners. An online survey of owners (n = 2,798) of dogs, cats, rabbits and Syrian hamsters explored awareness and knowledge of the Animal Welfare Act (AWA) (2006) (and equivalent legislation in Scotland and Northern Ireland) and the five welfare needs enshrined within it. Binary logistic regression was used to explore demographic variables associated with awareness and recognition of legislative provisions. Despite 72% of owners reporting that they were aware of their legal responsibilities, only 23% of participants could name the AWA, and only 29% could recognise all five welfare needs. Appropriate companionship was the least recognised need (33%), whereas the need to be protected from pain, suffering, injury and disease was most recognised (95%). Owner demographic factors, including age, education and type of companion animals owned, were significantly associated with awareness of the AWA and recognition of the five welfare needs. These findings suggest that awareness of companion animal-related legislation amongst owners is limited, particularly in relation to appropriate companionship. Where certain owner demographics are associated with lower legislative familiarity, this suggests significant potential for targeted education and awareness campaigns in order to raise awareness of legal responsibilities and ultimately improve companion animal welfare.

The majority of small- to medium-scale and Halal poultry processors still rely on electrical water-bath stunning, despite recognised concerns regarding its humaneness and effectiveness. The aim of this study was to evaluate a mechanical system that restrains and stuns broilers in an upright posture using head-only constant current electrical stunning. Two experiments were performed on slaughter-weight broilers. Experiment A (n = 37) assessed behavioural indices, carcase quality during restraint, and time to recovery following head-only electrical stunning at 400 (n = 15), 600 (n = 12) or 800 (n = 10) mA at 50 Hz (2.5-s exposure). Experiment B (n = 15) assessed electroencephalographic (EEG) and behavioural indices of brain function after constant current 600 mA head-only electrical stunning (50 Hz, 2.5-s exposure period) to determine the time to recovery of brain function. In Experiment A, all birds were rendered unconscious with all three current levels. However, time to return of neck tension, rhythmic breathing and balance was variable and longer for birds stunned at 400 mA, while 800 mA resulted in more wing flapping leading to carcase damage. In Experiment B, all birds recovered normal-like EEG activity. The mean time to return of rhythmic breathing was 37 (± 2) s; range: 24–50 s, with a trend towards a moderate correlation with return of normal-like EEG activity. In conclusion, this project demonstrated the proof of concept of upright restraint for head-only electrical stunning of broilers and the recoverability of the method, in line with Halal requirements.

Farm animal behaviour and welfare research may have limited generalisability if conducted on groups of animals characterised by a restricted set of individual factors and living conditions. In this sense, due to the contextual idiosyncrasies of individual testing sites, the results of individual studies could only be valid for the particular group of animals and thus may not always be reproducible. However, robust results are necessary to ensure that outcomes are broadly relevant, as this is vital if such results are intended to contribute to improved husbandry and management conditions, and ultimately, better animal welfare policies. So-called Big Team Science approaches (hereafter BTS), which pool resources across large numbers of researchers to facilitate data collection from larger and more diverse samples, can offer a resource-efficient opportunity to tackle this problem and increase the external validity of scientific results. Here, we discuss the benefits and challenges associated with BTS approaches in farm animal behaviour and welfare research. As contextual factors vary considerably across species kept for different products and in diverse husbandry settings, we conducted a snapshot review focusing on one of these species, the domestic goat (Capra hircus). Here, we found that the majority of studies were conducted at single sites and on only one breed. Finally, we introduce the ManyGoats initiative, which seeks to increase the generalisability of findings in research on goat behaviour and welfare by implementing identical experimental protocols and simultaneously testing animals, including multiple breeds, across different facilities around the world.

Light is a fundamental aspect of the environment, enabling animals to perceive and respond to visual stimuli as well as regulating circadian rhythms in physiology and behaviour. We have a good understanding of the rod and cone photoreceptors mediating vision, and work over the last 25 years has identified an additional retinal photoreceptor that regulates circadian rhythms and many other non-visual processes. This consists of a subset of intrinsically photosensitive retinal ganglion cells (ipRGCs) expressing the blue light sensitive protein melanopsin. To address these differences in visual and circadian responses to light, in humans, standards have been introduced to provide lighting units based upon the different photoreceptors involved. By contrast, lighting in laboratory animal facilities is still based on human vision and not the experience of the animals. Recent guidelines have, for the first time, provided the tools to measure light based upon the differing visual sensitivity of laboratory species such as mice (Mus musculus). Here, we provide an overview of why this is important, for both science and animal welfare, and how researchers and animal care staff can apply these new methods in their work. For the first time, this provides refinement opportunities to optimise lighting based on the animal’s experience of their light environment.

Changing long-held practices is hard. Employing change management strategies simplifies the process and makes it attainable. These strategies can be used in the vivarium to introduce changes that improve animal welfare. This manuscript describes how change management can be effectively used to transition a global organisation from traditional tail handling to refined handling of mice and rats across 68 international sites. Refined handling methods offer clear benefits for animal welfare, personnel well-being, and scientific integrity, yet tail handling remains common in many research settings. A combination of the Prosci ADKAR model and the Results Pyramid framework were used to create a structured, values-driven approach focused on awareness building, desire for change, knowledge development, hands-on skill acquisition, and sustained reinforcement. Key initiatives included targeted training for diverse stakeholder groups, global workshops, multilingual educational materials, pilot studies to address operational concerns, and a network of site-level champions to foster local ownership and success. Progress was assessed through follow-up surveys and site-level assessments to ensure meeting the pre-assigned success metrics and change success was reinforced with awards. Four years after the programme was initiated (2021–2025), all sites had successfully adopted refined handling for mice (Mus musculus) and rats (Rattus norvegicus), with reported improvements in human-animal interactions, reduced bite incidents, and no significant long-term increases in task duration or error rates. This work demonstrates that structured organisational change management can effectively drive large-scale refinement initiatives and promote a sustainable Culture of Care in laboratory animal programmes.

A global contract research organisation (CRO) aimed to transition to refined handling (RH; cupping and tunnel handling for mice [Mus musculus]; body and tunnel handling for rats [Rattus norvegicus]). Three surveys were used to assess handling methods, attitudes, resources needed, and challenges. Surveys included a 2022 survey to benchmark current handling practices (37 responses; 29 sites), a 2023 survey to assess progress (67 responses; 42 sites), and a 2025 survey to assess handling methods and attitudes following uptake of RH (255 responses; 37 sites). In 2022, 81% of sites primarily tail-handled mice. By 2025, RH methods were the primary methods. For rats, in 2022, body handling was the primary method of handling, but tail handling was common for young adult and older and/or less handled rats. By 2025, RH methods were the primary method for all rats. Personnel reported as never or rarely bitten increased from 52% in 2022 to 68% in 2025 for mice, and from 59% in 2022 to 90% in rats. The resources that were most useful were on-site training (77%) and ability to practice RH (59%). Ease of working with animals (60%) and relationship with animals (67%) improved after implementing RH with mice. Ease of working with animals (64%), job stress (50%), relationship with animals (71%), and job satisfaction (53%) improved after implementing RH with rats. The main challenges entailed getting used to alternative methods (i.e. muscle memory) (55% mice; 67% rats) and increased time (61% mice; 49% rats). Ultimately, benefits were reported for implementing RH for both mice and rats.

Animal welfare has to do with affective states, but animals cannot verbally express how they feel, meaning that indicators of affect must be sought in the realms of (non-verbal) behaviour, cognition and physiology. We scoped the human literature to identify cognitive functions linked to positive affect, as inspiration for research into cognitive indicators of positive affect in animals. In humans, positive affect and approach motivation are closely linked but the intensity of approach motivation varies between positive states. ‘Low-approach’ positive affect (e.g. mirth or contentment), most commonly induced in the reviewed studies, appears to facilitate selective attention toward reward, improve creativity, broaden attentional scope, increase cognitive flexibility where tasks present unusual items, and enhance memory for peripheral details. High-approach positive affect (e.g. desire) has sometimes opposite effects, which may resemble those of negative affect, although far fewer reviewed studies induced this affect type. High-approach positive affect seems to narrow attentional breadth and lead to enhanced memory for central details. Both low- and high-approach positive affect appear to promote problem-solving. While most human studies seem to induce low-approach positive affect, it is likely that many animal studies induce high-approach positive affect by using motivators to perform cognitive tasks (e.g. presentation of food rewards, peers, offspring). Taking this into account, alongside arousal and motivation effects, adapting the cognitive tests used in humans to non-human animal species has the potential to enhance our pool of potential indicators of positive affect and our ability to assess positive affect in animals, following rigorous validation.

Growing interest in bat-borne zoonoses has intensified field sampling of wild bats, raising questions about welfare, methodological transparency, and conservation impacts. We conducted a Systematic Quantitative Literature Review of zoonotic research published between 2014–2024 and involving capture and sampling of bats worldwide, querying Scopus and PubMed. A total of 226 studies met the inclusion criteria, spanning five continents and focusing predominantly on viruses (71.2%). Invasive procedures were frequent and often performed on species of conservation concern: euthanasia was reported in 48.2% of studies, anaesthesia in 20.3%, blood sampling in 18.6%, and PIT-tagging in 1.7%. Methodological transparency was frequently insufficient: 46.3% of studies failed to report essential procedural details, preventing assessment of adherence to welfare guidelines, while explicit non-compliance was identified in 15.0% of cases. Less than half of the studies supported their sampling approaches by citing established protocols or guidelines. Ethical approvals and capture or sampling authorisations were generally present, although inconsistently detailed. Overall, our findings reveal substantial gaps in procedural transparency in bat zoonotic research. We encourage the scientific community to strengthen welfare standards and ensure full methodological disclosure within a One Health-One Welfare framework, balancing public health objectives with wildlife welfare and long-term conservation priorities.

Animal welfare investigations on farms often reveal livestock neglect that may be associated with psychological distress, reduced capacity, or other challenges affecting farmer well-being. Most animal welfare assessment tools focus on animal-based indicators, and do not typically incorporate observable human or property indicators. This study explored animal protection officers’ observations and experiences during farm animal welfare investigations to identify observable human, property, and animal indicators associated with these investigations and to develop a One Welfare-informed assessment tool to support field-based assessments. Although investigations frequently involve animals already in distress, these indicators may reflect underlying strain that contributes to worsening welfare issues if unaddressed. Focusing on farming operations in Alberta, Canada, data were collected through focus groups and interviews with animal protection officers (n = 18) and analysed using inductive thematic analysis. Six themes were identified: property and grounds disrepair; compromised human living conditions; farmer distress; animal neglect; unusual livestock management; and animal and material overaccumulation. These themes reflected interconnected human, property, and animal indicators. Findings were translated into a 60-item assessment tool of farmer behaviour, property conditions, and animal care indicators that may support early identification of risk and guide tailored interventions when education or enforcement alone are insufficient. The tool includes Levels of Concern with recommended follow-up actions and was pilot tested by two officers. Integrating human and property indicators into animal welfare assessments would offer a practical approach to identifying concerns related to farmer well-being and animal welfare.