Epsilon Archive for Student Projects

Abstract

Animal welfare is impaired if the diet does not provide sufficient feeling of satiety or the ability to perform natural feeding behavior. Pigs are omnivores and spend most of the day searching for food by rooting, grazing and chewing. Both inability to perform foraging behavior and insufficient feeling of satiety often leads to direction of foraging behavior towards stereotyped and abnormal oral behavior. Dry sows are often fed restrictively which leads to unsatisfied feeling of hunger. Dietary fiber has been found to reduce stereotypic and abnormal behavior as well as aggression, which could indicate that pigs need to forage has been met giving a feeling of satiety. The long term effect is mainly found in viscous, soluble dietary fibers while bulky dietary fibers mainly provide only a short term feeling of satiety. For slaughter pigs the argument to use dietary fiber is mainly to provide foraging substrate rather than to nourish, even though roughages in the ration have been shown to be beneficial for the welfare of slaughter pigs. More studies are needed about the relationship between behavior, satiety and the use of different dietary fibers and appropriate admix. The aim of this review was to examine the relationship between dietary fiber and welfare in terms of feelings of satiety and the ability to perform natural feeding behaviors.