Loading...
Please wait, while we are loading the content...
Similar Documents
Analyse de trajectoires de chevaux mesurées par GPS pour l'optimisation des infrastructures de détention
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Faivre, Léna |
| Copyright Year | 2014 |
| Abstract | In Switzerland, horses are currently numerous but their housing systems are rarely well adapted to their natural needs. A great part live individually, in boxes most of the time, and a small part live in groups. These conditions are extremely far from a feral life, particularely concerning movement, social life and time activity repartition. Indeed, feral horses walk about 16 kilometers a day, stay in groups and spend a lot of time eating. Theses life conditions have direct influence on horse welfare and health, it is necessary to improve housing systems. To do so, one could study domestic horses behaviour in current swiss housing systems compared to feral horses behaviour. Experiences were carried out at the Swiss National Stud Farm, Avenches, with following material : paddocks, pens, carrousel, schools, boxes and 24 horses. GPS devices (Wintec, WBT202) were placed on horses and recorded their mouvement in distinct housing systems. Data collected were sorted then coupled with geographical information from a 10 centimers resolution orthophoto obtained thanks to R-POD drone, before being used to compute several results. The average daily distances travelled by horses in the two paddocks, all horses taken into account, were respectively 2 610 meters and 4 947 meters. This large difference could be attibuted to the surface available per horse, greater in the second paddock, and to the arrangement of the elements into the paddocks, that were more concentrated in the first paddock. During each horse turnout (pen, carrousel and work for stalled horses, work for some of the paddock horses), the distance, the distance per hour and the duration were computed. It appears that a stalled horse making 2 turnouts per day or a paddock horse making 1 turnout per day travel more than pastured domestic horses living in multi-hectares fields (about 7,5 km/day in average), and that a stalled horse making 3 turnout in one day travel more than a feral horse (about 16 km/day in average). However, one should not forget that distance is not the only factor to consider : speed, duration and horse emotional state are also important. The soil type preferences study revealed no significant result, either in paddocks or pens. Finally, activity time analysis for both domestic and feral horses suggested that feeding time of domestic horses is shorter. This results were used to give some advices for housing systems optimization. When possible, one should prefer paddock housing than box housing, by providing a surface as big as possible per horse and proposing an intelligent arrangement of the elements for horses movement promotion. The paddock should contain a straw litter, which fills horses and make them chew, and propose an automatic hay feeding system which feeds in small quantity and all along the day, in order to extend and spread alimentation time. Table des matières |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://documents.epfl.ch/groups/l/la/lasig-unit/www/pdm/Faivre%20L%C3%A9na%20PdM.pdf |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
