Enhancing Stress Assessment in Sledge Reindeer (Rangifer tarandus): APilot Study on Infrared Thermal Imaging and its Opportunities for Advancement as a Welfare Assessment Tool
Measuring immediate physiological stress responses in animals can be challenging; saliva and blood sampling, while invasive, may also generate confounding stress responses, and equipping animals with heart rate sensors is not always feasible. Nevertheless, emerging technologies offer a non-invasiv...
Saved in:
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
|---|---|
| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Animal Behavior and Cognition
2024-08-01
|
| Series: | Animal Behavior and Cognition |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.animalbehaviorandcognition.org/uploads/journals/59/4%20Liehrmann_ABC_11(3).pdf |
| Tags: |
Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| Summary: | Measuring immediate physiological stress responses in animals can be challenging; saliva and blood
sampling, while invasive, may also generate confounding stress responses, and equipping animals with heart rate
sensors is not always feasible. Nevertheless, emerging technologies offer a non-invasive and contactless method to
measure additional body surface temperature changes induced by acute stress, using infrared thermal measurement of
the eye caruncle region. Contactless temperature measurement has the potential to assess the emotional state of animals
affected by human physical contact. Reindeer, being highly sensitive to touch and naturally avoiding physical contact,
exemplify this case. With growing interest in safari tours involving sledging reindeer, there is a need to investigate
how these animals are affected by human interactions and how they adapt to daily close contact. In this pilot
experiment, we evaluated the efficacy of thermal imaging in measuring medial canthus temperature fluctuations in
non-habituated sledging reindeer while being petted by unfamiliar humans. Our findings support the hypothesis that
medial canthus temperature significantly decreases during petting and increases once the interaction ceases, aligning
with established stress response patterns found in the literature. This pilot experiment underscores the potential of
infrared thermal imaging for non-invasively monitoring physiological responses to stress in tamed reindeer. Moreover,
it sets the foundation for refining methodologies and experimental designs using infrared thermal imaging in animal
welfare research. |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 2372-4323 |