Animal Enrichment

The Animal Science departments at Delaware Valley College are concerned with providing the best possible environment for their animals. This means meeting the animals’ physical, physiological and social needs. There has been considerable research on farm and lab animal behavior in the last few decades. This research has demonstrated that environmental enrichment can improve the welfare of captive animals, especially if animals need to be housed alone. One can advance animal welfare in many ways, including the addition of novel enrichment devices or food treats, for example. At the onset of this program, there were few enrichment strategies used with the agricultural animals on campus. Our mission became clear:

Develop and implement strategies for environmental enhancement and enrichment of the diverse animal populations housed at Delaware Valley College and give students another opportunity to work with agricultural animals at the facilities on campus in order to further their education and experience with live animals.

Sample enhancement/enrichment categories:

• Social housing, safe and positive human-animal interaction
• Dietary environment (what the animal eats and how the animal gets food)
• Sensory and physical environment (cover, stimulate foraging, bedding material, toys, etc.)

This program focuses on providing human contact and improving physical conditions for pigs, horses, dairy calves, llamas and dogs housed at Delaware Valley College. This student volunteer program may, in time, expand to include additional animal species. Animal Enrichment is offered as a one-credit course elective through the Animal Science Department. Small Animal Science students are targeted for inclusion into the program, although students of all majors are welcome to participate. Upperclassmen with previous experience are employed to assist in training new participants and to help implement the enrichment strategies.

To design a successful program, one must understand how an animal naturally behaves, how it views its environment and what its preferences are. Measuring animal well being and the success of the enrichment program should be included in the design of the program. Program success can be measured when careful observations and records are kept. One goal is to increase species' typical behaviors while decreasing pathological maladaptive behaviors through the provision of an “enriched” environment. With a successful enrichment program, animals are easy to handle and restrain and readily accept procedure manipulations, thus making routine tasks, like standard grooming practices, easy to accomplish. Other appropriate indicators of successful enrichment programs may include animal health improvements, or physiological function, an increased range of normal behaviors and a decrease in the periods of inactivity and improvements in the animals’ ability to cope with environmental stresses.

Program Goals:

• Provide students the opportunity to interact with the agricultural stock in order to further their education and experience with agricultural animals
• Improve animal welfare through an inexpensive enrichment program using strategies from the three enrichment/enhancement categories
• Redesign the current program to provide greater value to the college student and in return get better participation and retention
• Provide research and project opportunities
• Present ideas to the large animal facility managers and caregivers to increase awareness and participation in environmental enrichment for agricultural animals continuously.

For more information, contact Program Coordinators Dr. Pam Reed at (215) 489-4958 or Ms. Rebecca Hughes at (215) 489-4895.