Navel healing and calf fitness for transport

Dairy male calves are at risk of welfare compromise as they are usually transported at a very young age. The European Union has set a “completely healed navel” requirement for calf transport; moreover, a minimum age is established for longer journeys. However, this requirement has proven to be prone to misinterpretation. This study aimed to clarify what is meant by “navel healing” and to provide strong elements for reaching a consensus. The navels of 299 dairy calves (55 males, 244 females) aged 0–90 days were examined and scored 1 to 5 according to their healing status. Based on our results, a completely dry and shriveled navel (score 3) would imply a 25.5–38.0% risk of transporting too young calves. Alternatively, the presence of a scab covering the umbilical wound (score 4) would entail a 4.3% risk of transporting calves less than 10 days old and could be considered good practice for transporting calves (except for journeys exceeding 8 h). Conversely, complete navel healing (score 5) guarantees that calves that are too young are not transported; therefore, it should be considered best practice for transporting calves in general and the minimum requirement for transporting calves for journeys exceeding 8 h.雄性乳用犊牛通常在极幼年阶段即被转运，因此面临福利受损的风险。欧盟针对犊牛转运制定了“脐部完全愈合（completely healed navel）”的要求，同时针对长距离转运设定了最低年龄限制。然而，该要求已被证实极易被误读。本研究旨在明确“脐部愈合”的具体内涵，并为达成共识提供有力依据。研究人员对299头0~90日龄乳用犊牛（其中雄性55头、雌性244头）的脐部进行了检查，并依据其愈合状态评分为1至5分。基于本研究结果，脐部完全干燥皱缩（评分3）意味着转运过幼年犊牛的风险为25.5%~38.0%。或者，若脐部伤口存在痂皮覆盖（评分4），则转运不足10日龄犊牛的风险仅为4.3%，该情况可被视为犊牛转运的良好操作规范（时长超过8小时的转运除外）。与之相反，脐部完全愈合（评分5）可确保不会转运过幼年犊牛，因此其可被作为所有犊牛转运场景的最佳操作规范，同时也是时长超过8小时的犊牛转运的最低要求。