Applying proximity sensors to monitor beef cattle social behaviour as an indicator of animal welfare

There are currently no approved monitoring programs in the beef industry that use paddock based behaviour as an indicator of animal welfare. Current animal welfare assessments are conducted at a single point in time, such as supplying food and water and treating illnesses as these needs arise. These aspects comply with the five freedoms that animals should have when addressing animal welfare, however, the assessments are infrequent. Of the five freedoms, the freedom to express normal behaviour can be a subjective measure, due to differences in the way individual animals express certain behaviours. There is a need for continual monitoring of welfare indicators in modern animal assessment methods to objectively measure behaviour and address public concerns about the welfare state of animals. The experiment commenced in June 2017 to assess changes in cattle social interaction patterns in response to social stress created by regrouping four groups of eight heifers. Previous research with cattle has provided evidence that social contact and spatial behaviour differ when novel individuals are introduced (Patison et al., 2010b), and re-grouped animals continue to experience stress until the social hierarchy is re-established after regrouping (Kondo and Hurnik, 1990). Proximity sensors that record the frequency and duration of close proximity contacts (