A brief report on intraspecies aggressive biting in a goat herd
Licensed under
| Category | Journal Articles |
|---|---|
| Abstract |
This study aimed at analysing the effects of age, horn and places on biting and butting as intraspecies aggressive activities. Seventy-two Turkish Saanen goats were used as animal material and 22,686 aggressive behaviours were recorded in different places from a total of 118 h direct observation. Of the observations of aggressive behaviours, 32.7% was biting behaviour and the rest was butting behaviour. The frequency of biting behaviour in 3 or more years old goats was significantly higher than that of biting behaviour in 1 and 2 years old animals (P<=0.01). The observations revealed that horned or hornless goats exhibited biting behaviour; however the frequency of biting behaviour in hornless goats was 2.38 times higher than in horned goats (P<=0.01). Biting and butting behaviours were found to be well correlated with the area of places (P<=0.01). As the area of places got narrowed, the frequency of biting increased. However, such a trend was not observed in butting behaviour. The frequency of butting behaviour again increased with the increase in social hierarchy (P<=0.01), whereas the frequency of biting behaviour was not affected by social hierarchy (P=0.30). In conclusion, intraspecies biting behaviour, which is thought to have developed as a result of horn absence, should be questioned whether this is unique to the herd or to the genotype. |
| Date | 2007 |
| Publication Title | Applied Animal Behaviour Science |
| Volume | 102 |
| Issue | 1/2 |
| Pages | 124-129 |
| ISBN/ISSN | 0168-1591 |
| DOI | 10.1016/j.applanim.2006.03.002 |
| Author Address | Department of Animal Science, Faculty of Agriculture, Canakkale Onsekiz Mart University, 17020 Canakkale, Turkey.cemiltolu@comu.edu.tr |
| Additional Language | English |
| Cite this work |
Researchers should cite this work as follows: |
| Tags | |
| Badges |
