Abstract
The majority of dairy cows in Ontario are housed in tie-stall barns, with tremendous variability in stall characteristics and dimensions among farms. An observational study conducted by our research group on 317 farms in 2003 identified several key stall characteristics as being associated with lameness, injury and cow cleanliness. Specifically, increased length of tie chain was associated with increased cow cleanliness and a decrease in hock lesions. To further investigate the importance of neck chain length, a pilot study was conducted to examine the behaviour of dairy cows in stalls with two different chain lengths and to determine if cows would exhibit a behavioral preference for increased chain length.
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