Faculty of Technical Sciences

Stereotypies can take many different forms but many studies and the WelFur protocol pool these together. However, it is currently unknown if these different forms of stereotypic behaviour share a similar motivational background and have equal welfare significance for the mink. As part of a larger study addressing this issue, we investigated whether free access to a running wheel would substitute, i.e. reduce the prevalence of, the various forms of stereotypic behaviour (SB). We screened in 2019 c. 1100 Palomino and Brown mink dams, individually housed at the AU-farm, into six groups based on their behavioural phenotype: CONTROL (n=18) free from abnormal behaviour, FURCHEW (n=14) fur-chewing, ORALSB (N=11) with licking SB, STATSB (n=15) with stationary SB, PACERS (n=16) with pacing, and MIXED (n=14) with several forms of abnormal behaviour. These 88 mink were relocated to cages with running wheel access for 10 days. We analysed running wheel activity as rounds per days (rpd, i.e. per 24h) using repeated measures mixed ANOVA. The runningwheel naïve mink dams started more or less immediately to use the running wheels (avg. per mink 960 rpd on the first day, 1025 rpd on day 10). There was a considerable variation in running wheel activity between mink. The major finding was that running wheel activity differed between groups with PACERS, STATSB and MIXED groups using the running wheel significantly more (1474, 1404 and 1753 rpd, respectively) than the other groups (P<0.001; avg. 336-467 rpd). Thus, different forms of abnormal behaviour influence the running wheel activity in mink. Results on the effects on stereotypic behaviour will be presented.