Stress and nest-boxes in farmed fox

Abstract

Farmed foxes are conventionally kept in barren wire cages without a nest-box for most of the year. Only in the breeding period do they have a nest-box, in which they deliver and raise their young. Without a nest-box, foxes are constantly exposed to potentially stressing stimuli from neighbours and farm personnel. With a nest-box attached to the cage all year round, foxes are able to hide at will, and thereby to control their input of stressing visual stimuli. Whether foxes avail themselves of this possibility to control levels of social stress, was examined in an experiment with 100 silver fox vixens. Fifty animals were assigned to the experimental group and kept individually for 2 years in 2-m 2 wire cages from which they had free access to three nest-boxes. The fifty other animals were assigned to the control group and kept without access to nest-boxes but under otherwise identical conditions. Experimental animals had lower base levels of cortisol and eosinophil leukocytes, were more active in an open field, and less fearful towards humans. Experimental animals were less fearful and more aggressive or exploratory no matter how and where behaviour was assessed, whether it was assessed in the cage, during capture or in an open field runway. It is concluded that adult silver fox vixens kept with access to nest-boxes all year round experience less stress than control animals kept without boxes. Behavioural genetics and domestication J.M. Faure and A.D. Mills INRA, Station de Recherches Avicoles, Nouzilly, 37380 Monnaie, France ABSTRACT Price defined domestication as that process by which a population of animals becomes adapted to man and to the captive environment by some combination of genetic change occurring over generations and environmentally induced developmental events reoccurring during each generation. It isPrice defined domestication as that process by which a population of animals becomes adapted to man and to the captive environment by some combination of genetic change occurring over generations and environmentally induced developmental events reoccurring during each generation. It is