Some physiological and behavioral characteristics in weaned goat kids

Animal welfare becomes more important with the intensification process in livestock production. Many factors have effects on animal in the production conditions and some of these cause stress. Some of the inevitable practices done in year could also be a source of stress. Weaning should especially be done in the dairy goat farms in every year as one of the routine works. Separating the mother and the young that they have a strong tie have negative effects on mother as well as the kid. In this study, in Saanen goat and kids, the stress comes out from the weaning was wanted to be defined with the help of some physiologic parameters and behaviors. With this aim, in different periods of before and after weaning some measurements and observations were done. In goats and kids, in the physiologic parameters, the effect of time had a highly significant effect on the numbers of pulse and respiratory and also rectal temperature (P<0.01). Pulse rates of kids before and after weaning were determined at 6. h, 24. h, 48. h, 72. h, 1. week, 2. week and 3. week were 103.32, 97.82, 88.74, 95.82, 89.78, 89.78, 89.44 and 92.47 per min; in goats were 78.00, 67.20, 70.00, 71.00, 81.30, 69.20, 68.00 and 74.80 per min; the respiratory rate in kids 36.88, 33.80, 35.38, 31.38, 31.71, 34.54, 28.90 and 42.20 per min, in goats were 24.4, 39.6, 33.0, 28.4, 29.6, 26.8, 26.0 and 28.0 per min; the rectal temperature in kids were 39.41, 39.38, 39.78, 39.52, 39.49, 40.05, 39.27 and 39.92 oC, in goats were 39.15, 39.64, 38.89, 38.90, 38.21, 39.00, 38.88 and 39.17 oC, respectively. Three weeks after the weaning, depending on time, feed intake, standing, lying down and abnormal mouth activities were varied significantly. Feed intake behavior at 1., 2. and 3. weeks after the weaning were 21.02%, 19.63% and 28.75%; lying down behavior were 39.92%, 42.71% and 32.00%; standing behavior were 18.03%, 21.60% and 20.35%, rumination were 15.27%, 11.66% and 14.49%; drinking water behavior were 0.58%, 0.81% and 0.43%; and abnormal mouth activities were 1.10%, 0.38% and 0.30%, respectively. Key words: Goat, weaning, physiological parameters, behavior