Losing aggressive contests may impact survival, reproductive success and animal welfare. Previous experience plays an important role in shaping contest behaviour, but less is known about how individual variation in learning abilities influences contest dynamics and resource-holding potential. Here, we investigated whether learning performance (acquisition learning and reversal learning) in domestic pigs, Sus scrofa, predicts the outcome of a contest against an unfamiliar opponent. While acquisition learning speed did not predict contest outcome, pigs that successfully learned the reversal were more likely to win the contest than pigs that failed to learn the reversal. As expected, weight difference between opponents was also an important factor in predicting contest outcome. Our results suggest that cognitive flexibility may confer an advantage in contests, unless pigs already have a substantial weight advantage over their opponent. These findings advance our understanding of the role of cognitive processes in animal contests and suggest that promoting cognitive flexibility may reduce the potential welfare impacts arising from stressful social defeat. Further research is required to determine whether cognitive flexibility influences assessment strategy and allows pigs to resolve contests with fewer costs. (c) 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/).

The importance of maternal care in commercial pig production is largely ignored. The sow has little possibility to interact with her piglets, and piglets are often subjected to early weaning or artificial rearing. This study aimed to investigate aspects of physiological and behavioural maternal provisioning that contribute to offspring outcomes. We hypothesised that better maternal care and nutritional provisioning would relate positively to piglet immunity, growth and behaviour. Nineteen sows and their litters were studied in free-farrowing pens. Oxytocin and tumour necrosis factor-α in colostrum/milk and salivary cortisol were sampled from sows throughout lactation. Sows were assessed for dominance rank, response to handling, maternal defensiveness, suckling initiation and termination, posture and sow-piglet contact. Piglets were weighed, measured for body mass index (BMI) and sampled for blood (Immunoglobulin G; at birth). After weaning, they experienced a human approach test (HAT) and novel object test. Correlations were explored between individual sow characteristics, individual piglet outcomes, and between sow characteristics and piglet outcomes averaged by litter. Significant correlations between sow and piglet factors were analysed at the litter level in mixed models with piglet outcomes as response variables and sow characteristics as predictor variables, while accounting for sow parity, litter size and batch. Litters grew faster when their sow had lower cortisol values (P = 0.03), while sows with lower cortisol levels had more successful suckling bouts and engaged in greater amounts of sow-piglet contact. Litters had a lower BMI at weaning when the sow had a higher milk fat percentage at d3. Litters of the most dominant sows took longer to approach the human in the HAT, while litters of sows with higher cortisol at d0 took longer to approach the novel object when assessed on correlations (r = 0.82, P < 0.001) but not when the model accounted for parity and litter size (P = 0.35). Only some of the measured nutritive and non-nutritive sow factors influenced litter performance and behaviour, with parity and litter size also playing a role. Given the continued increase in litter size, but also the interest in loose-housed lactation pens for sows, further research on sows' maternal investment and how it can be optimised is warranted.

The aim of this study was to characterize posture behavior and truck microclimate of 2 to 8-week-old unweaned calves (59.1 ± 6.72 kg body weight) during 10 transports between December and September (one/month) from an assembly center in Dalry, Scotland to Northern Spain via a control post in Northern Ireland and an assembly center in France (Cherbourg). Average journey time was 105.8 h. A subset of 20 calves per transport were fitted with collars carrying a HOBO environmental logger (HOBO U12) to record the temperature and humidity at calf’ head level and an accelerometer (Axivity AX3) to record accelerations to assess the calf posture (resting, standing or in transition). Data were analyzed with JMP. During the transport, 60% of the time animals were standing, 28% of the time lying and 12% transitioning. Specifically, when the truck was in motion calves spent 82.8% of the time standing, when stationary 68.8% standing, when the truck was on the ferry standing time was 48.4% and at the control post and assembly center standing time was 45.1%.Transports from June to September (n = 4) had an average of 11.96 h (min: 5.17 h; max: 18.8 h) of temperatures greater than 30°C, an average of 25 h (min: 0 h; max: 55 h) of mild heat conditions (72 < THI < 79), and an average of 3.5 h (min: 0 h; max: 23 h) of moderate heat conditions (80 < THI < 89). The exposure to mild and moderate heat conditions occurred mainly during the time that the truck was stationary (waiting at ports) and when calves rested at the control post. Results from this study supports the need to evaluate the impact summer months journeys where animals spend over 30% of the time under heat stress, and the long-standing times on animal welfare.

Previously, the benefits of early-life socialisation on later-life social development have been reported in pigs. Here we investigated the effect of pre-weaning socialisation on the later-life cognitive ability of pigs using a range of techniques. Pre-weaning, 101 piglets had access to a neighbouring pen from ~ 15 days of age and interacted with non-littermates (socialised). An additional 89 piglets remained isolated within their home pen (controls). After weaning, 100 individuals were selected for a range of cognitive tests including a food reward T-maze test, reversal learning T-maze test, a social preference T-maze test, and a puzzle box test. Performance during the food reward test was not influenced by treatment. Treatment effected improvement over the course of the reversal learning test, with controls showing a significant decrease in trial duration after the first two trials. During the social preference test, socialised pigs spent significantly more time in the presence of larger stimulus pigs than controls and were quicker to leave the middle of the maze, suggesting improved social skills. Neither sex nor treatment was observed to influence pig's ability to solve the puzzle box. Thus, overall, evidence from the social preference test suggests an effect of pre-weaning socialisation on aspects of social cognitive development.