The influence of barley food rewards on sheep movement through a handling system

Abstract

The use of barley food rewards to improve sheep handling was evaluated in two experiments. In Experiment 1, six groups of sheep were trained to run through a race system and into a sheep-handling machine. Three groups were rewarded and three were not. After 10 days of training over 1 month, rewarded and unrewarded groups were either not handled, clamped in the machine, or clamped and inverted in the machine, and the efficiency of handling was measured. Food rewards significantly reduced the amount of labour required for sheep handling. Less time was spent pushing up rewarded sheep than unrewarded sheep for all handling treatments, and the race system was more than 90% efficient in 9 out of 15 tests with rewarded sheep compared with 1 out of 15 for unrewarded sheep. In Experiment 2, long-term memory was assessed by re-testing the same sheep 1 year later. Similar results to the first test were obtained for control (not handled) and clamped groups, but for inverted sheep there was no significant difference in push-up time between rewarded and unrewarded groups. These results suggest that sheep have excellent long-term memories of sheep handling procedures, both when rewarded and unrewarded. Although the effectiveness of food rewards was diminished as the severity of the handling treatment increased, the results indicate that rewarding sheep could lead to long-term improvement in sheep handling efficiency, especially when severe treatments are performed rarely.