Managing undocked pigs – on-farm prevention of tail biting and attitudes towards tail biting and docking

Table 3 Perceived importance of the different tail biting intervention measures given in the questionnaire

Measure	Average (standard deviation)⁵	Median (interquartile range)^5,6
Identifying the biter	6.49 (0.97)	7 (1)^a
Removing the biter from the pen	6.29 (1.08)	7 (1)^a
Adding bedding-type material¹	5.79 (1.34)	6 (2)^b
Removing the bitten pig from the pen	5.39 (1.30)	6 (1)^b
Adding objects for manipulation²	4.71 (1.62)	5 (2)^c
Reducing animal density³	4.60 (1.70)	5 (2)^c
Use of anti-biting substances on the tail⁴	4.31 (1.10)	5 (3)^c

¹Such as straw, wood-shavings/sawdust, peat
²Such as chains, wood
³By removing (any) pigs from the pen
⁴Such as tar, Porcivet®
⁵Scale: 1 (not important at all) to 7 (very important)
⁶Different subscripts indicate differences in median rating between the factors (p < 0.05)

ISSN: 2055-5660