Effects Of Music Type And Volume On The Welfare Level In Weaned Piglets

The aim of this experiment was to study the effect of music type and volume on the welfare levelin weaned piglets and to find stress indicator of weaned piglets. Some biochemistry indexes werestudied in this research, such as production performance, saliva cortisol content, behavior, skintemperature, fresh fecal odor, alpha-amylase, IgG, sIgA and IL-1β. At the same time, the salivarycortisol, α-amylase and lysozyme’s correlation was analyzed in this experiment.Two hundred and eighty weaned piglets at28d with similar initial weight (8.6±0.96kg) wererandomly allocated into five groups (control, relieve55dB group, relieve75dB group, cheerful55dBgroup, cheerful75dB group). Each group had8replicates of7pigs, which come from the same pen.Except the control group, the other four trements were designed by two factorial design, in order tostudy the effect of music type (relieve and cheerful) and volume (55dB and75dB) on piglets.Experiment period was42d. Relieve music is Annie’s Wonderland，which is two quarter beat; and thecheerful music is Voice of Spring, which is three quarter beat. The music was played during8:00-11:00and14:00-17:00.1. Effect of music type and volume on production performance in weaned pigs75dB volume significantly or great significantly decreased piglet’s ADG （P <0.05）and ADFI (P<0.01). The music type had no effect on piglet’s production performance. Music type and volume hadsignificant interaction on ADFI (P <0.05): Piglets of Cheerful music (55dB) had hightest ADFI in themusic group. Cheerful music (55dB) had the higest production performance in the five treatments.2. Effect of music type and volume on stress level⑴Except14thday, compared to55dB volume group,75dB significantiy increased pigs’ skintemperature (P <0.05). Music type had no effect on it. Music type and volume had great significantinteraction on skin temperature (P <0.01) on7th,21stand42ndday: Cheerful music increased piglet’sskin temperature in75dB environment, but decreased piglet skin temperature in55dB environment.Cheerful music (55dB) had the lowest skin temperature in the five treatments.⑵During the whole experiment period, the music type and volume had no effect on salivarycortisol and alpha-amylase, and had no significant interaction. With the development of experiment,salivary cortisol and alpha-amylase was significantly (P <0.05) or highly significantly (P <0.01)changed. Salivary cortisol decreased at first and increased at last. Alpha-amylase increased at first anddecreased at last.3. Effect of music type and volume on immune indicatorsThe volume had no effect on saliva lysozyme, but the music type significantly effect on it on1stand7thday (P <0.05). Music type and volume had significant (P <0.05) or great significant (P <0.01)interaction on lysozyme level on7th,14th,21stand42ndday. The cheerful music had a higher lysozymelevel in75dB environment, but a lower lysozyme in55dB environment. With the conduct of experiment, lysozyme level significantly decreased (P <0.01).Saliva immune parameters result showed that75dB volume great significantly decreased pigs’slivary sIgA content (P <0.01).4. Effect of music type and volume on behaviorOn2ndday, the control group had a significantly higher sternal lying behavior than other fourtreatments (P <0.01), and significantly lower lateral lying and half lateral lying behavior (P <0.01).Sternal lying behavior of control group, cheerful low volume group and cheerful high volume group getgreat signicantly decreased with the development of experiment. Drinking, aggression and penmanipulate behavior had no differience between the five treatments.5. Effect of music type and volume on fresh stoolCheerful music group’s fresh fecal odor is significantly different from control group on21stday;and the fresh fecal odor of cheerful music and control, high volume (75db) and control, low volume (55dB) and control can distinguish from each other completely. Further analysis showed that alkanes maybe the main reason which changed piglets’ fresh stool odor. Metabolomics results show that1,2-dichloroethane, hexanoic acid,1,3,5-tridithiane, Leu-Glu, Ser-Gly-Ser may altered the ion in freshstool.6. Correlation analysis of Salivary cortisol, salivary amylase and lysozymeSalivary and had a higher correlation on1st(-0.40) and14th(-0.43). Salivary cortisol was positivelyrelated to lysozyme on1stday (0.47) and14thday (0.45). Saliva alpha-amylase was negative related tolysozyme on1stday (-0.41). With the development of experiment, the correlation coefficient of the threedecreased.It was concluded that75dB volume increase pigs’ skin temperature, reduce pigs’ productionperformance and immune indicator, and had adverse effect on piglets’ welfare level. Cheerful musicincrease pigs’ saliva lysozyme, and is harmful to pigs’ healthy. Cheerful music group (55dB) hadlowerest skin temperature and hightset production performance. Salivary cortisol, amylase andlysozyme can indicate piglets’welfare level in early period of experiment, but not obvious later.