Elsevier

Small Ruminant Research

Volume 191, October 2020, 106166
Small Ruminant Research

Dominance hierarchy, milking order, and neighbour preference in domestic goats

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.smallrumres.2020.106166Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Higher animals received and initiated more affiliative behaviours.

  • Older animals with long horns were high in dominance hierarchy.

  • No correlation between social position and milking order was found.

  • Aggressive behaviours were performed most frequently at milking parlour.

Abstract

The social behaviour of farm animals is capable of influencing their welfare and production results (e.g. milk yield), and thus is very important, both for animals and farmers. The aim of the present study was to investigate dominance hierarchy, milking order, and neighbour preference in domestic goats. Animals were kept under semi-extensive management. In total, 72 milked goats (Saanen goat × German Improved Fawn) were observed for 150 h. A number of agonistic and affiliative behaviours were observed. Larger animals (in terms of height) and animals with longer horns were more aggressive, but also initiated and received more affiliative behaviours. Age and horn length were the most important factors influencing social position; older animals with long horns were high in the dominance hierarchy. Milking order was not significantly correlated with social position. We found that some goats preferred certain neighbours during rest periods (the goats would lie down together), choosing animals characterised by similar age, aggression level, and social position. Additionally, we found that the occurrence of some behaviours varied depending on location, e.g. goats exhibited affiliative behaviour mainly in the goat house.

Introduction

The goat (Capra hircus), domesticated about 9000 bc (Zeder and Hesse, 2000), is considered the first ruminant livestock species (Hatziminaoglou and Boyazoglu, 2004). It is an extremely useful animal; thanks to goat husbandry, humans can live in areas that would otherwise be largely unpopulated (Hinson, 2015). Domestic goats, like their wild ancestors, are social animals which establish social hierarchies. The social behaviours of goats can be divided into two main categories, affiliative and agonistic (Miranda-de la Lama and Mattiello, 2010). It is claimed that the main function of agonistic behaviour is to reduce aggression within the group (Rowell, 1974; Gauthereaux, 1978). Moreover, the suggested role of agonistic behaviour in social animals is to provide a greater supply of resources to dominant than to subdominant animals (Craig, 1981). Furthermore, it is worth noting that this type of behaviour involves the expenditure of energy and infliction of injuries (Syme and Syme, 1979) which may lead to economic losses. During the establishment of a hierarchy, animals exhibit aggressive behaviour towards other members of the flock, but their positions, once established, are maintained for a long time with some reinforcements such as threats, head-butting, etc. (Canali et al., 1986). The occurrence of agonistic behaviour is increased during feeding time and in herds characterised by high density (Pretorius, 1970; Barroso et al., 2000; Miranda-de la Lama and Mattiello, 2010). Stress levels in both dominant and subdominant individuals may be high and may lead to declines in production (Barroso et al., 2000). Fights between animals cause injuries, and stress reduces milk/meat production, reflected in economic losses. On the other hand, goats are capable of creating social bonds and expressing affiliative behaviour, including reconciliation (Schino, 1998; Górecki, 2005). Therefore, the first aim of this study was to determine the hierarchy in a group of dairy goat females and analyse the relationships between various traits of individuals (age, horn length, height at the withers) and their social position. Secondly, relationship between social position and milking order was examined; finally, companionship preferences and the factors affecting them were studied.

Section snippets

Animals and management

Observations were conducted at the Jasionek ecological farm, Poland. The herd (100 individuals) was composed of milked goats, non-milked goats, and goatlings. A group of 72 milked goats (Saanen goat × German Improved Fawn) was used in the present study. Ages ranged between 1 and 11 years (x¯ = 3.2 ± 1.99 years). The majority of animals were horned; 18 goats were hornless (15 individuals had been dehorned). In the studied herd, dehorning had been applied, but the owners had subsequently decided

Results

In this study, several forms of social behaviours were observed. The relevant categories and forms of behaviour were noted in Table 1.

Social behaviours were identified as aggressive initiated, aggressive received, submissive, affiliative initiated, affiliative received, and lying down and touching. Descriptive statistics of the frequency of these behaviour categories are presented in Table 2.

Correlations between age, horn length, and height at the withers were analysed (Table 3). Age and height

Forms of social behaviour

Animal social behaviour can be divided into two groups: affiliative and agonistic (Rutter, 2002). Initial studies on goats focused only on aggressive behaviours (Hafez et al., 1969; Shackleton and Shank, 1984), whereas affiliative behaviours were studied only later (Schino, 1998; Górecki, 2005; Sztych et al., 2005; Miranda-de la Lama and Mattiello, 2010). All affiliative behaviours observed by Górecki (2005), including lying near each other, snout touching, snout rubbing, leaning a leg on

Conclusion

In conclusion, we found that animals characterised by greater height at the withers and those with longer horns were more aggressive, but also initiated and received more affiliative behaviours. Age and horn length were the most important factors influencing social position; older animals with long horns were high in the dominance hierarchy. Milking order was not correlated with social position. The occurrence of certain behaviours varied depending on the whereabouts of the goats, e.g. goats

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to owners of ecological farm “Jasionek”, who allowed to conduct observations. Study was financed with statutory research (506.569.04.00). All authors have no conflict of interest to declare. All procedures applied were in accordance with Polish law. They did not cause animal suffering and did not require ethics committee approval.

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