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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 52 Page i CONTENTS Vol 16 No 1 April 2017 Editorial Jas Barley Chair of the Editorial Board ix Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment David Simpson 1 Report of a RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research Barney Reed Sarah Beatham Steve Carter Ros Clubb Kate Garrod Matt Gale Matt Gomm Katherine Knight Julie Lane Fiona Mathews Patricia Pimlott Adrian Smith Rory Wilson Ute Weyer and Penny Hawkins 13 PAPER SUMMARY TRANSLATIONS 27 TECH 2 TECH Thinking outside the Tox Sandy Mackay 39 What it means for me to be a veterinary technician in biomedical research James Champion 41 Preparing to write a scientific abstract Jas Barley 44 ANDREW BLAKE TRIBUTE AWARD ENTRIES Time for change Practicalities of implementing non aversive methods for handling mice John Waters AS ET CONGRESS 2017 BURSARY COMPETITION ESSAYS Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made Micah Dupont 47 57 Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made Callum Branstone 59 Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made Silke Kleefeld 61 Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made Jade Bacon 63 Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made Justyna Barratt 65 Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made Jess Clark 67 CONGRESS 2016 PLATFORM PRESENTATION ABSTRACTS 69 POSTER PRESENTATIONS What do research people really think about animal welfare Norman Mortell 73 Effect of moderate environmental enrichment on commonly used behavioural tests in rats Silke Kleefeld Karen Bannerton and John Kelly 75 Instructions to Authors xi Index to Advertisers xx i

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 52 Page ii IAT REPRESENTATIVES OFFICERS President Dr Robin Lovell Badge FRS Immediate Past President Professor Sir Richard Gardner MA PhD FRSB FIAT Hon FRS Vice Presidents David Anderson MRCVS Stephen Barnett BA MSc FIAT Hon CBiol FRSB RAnTech Brian Cass CBE Miles Carroll PhD Gerald Clough BSc PhD EurBiol CBiol MRSB SFZSL Paul Flecknell MA Vet MB PhD DLAS DipLECVA MRCVS Sue Houlton BVSc MA DVR DVC MRCVS Wendy Jarrett MA Judy MacArthur Clark CBE BVMS DLAS FRSB DVMS h c DipECLAM FRAgS DipACLAM MRCVS Fiona McEwen BSc BVM S MSc MRCVS Tim Morris BVetMed PhD DipACLAM DipECLAM CBiol FRSB CertLAS MRCVS Jos Orellana BVSc MSc Clive Page PhD BSc Vicky Robinson CBE BSc PhD Gail Thompson RLATG Robert Weichbrod PhD RLATG Lord Robert Winston FMedSci DSc FRCOG FRCP FRCS Ed FRSB Life Members Charlie Chambers MIAT RAnTech Roger Francis MSC FIAT RAnTech Pete Gerson MSc FIAT RAnTech Cathy Godfrey FIAT RAnTech John Gregory BSc Hons FIAT CBiol FRSB RAnTech Patrick Hayes FIAT DipBA RAnTech Robert Kemp FIAT Hon RAnTech Keith Millican FIAT CBiol MSRB Phil Ruddock MIAT RAnTech Ted Wills HonFIAT RAnTech Dorothy Woodnott FIAT Honorary Members Andy Jackson MIAT Brian Lowe MSc FIAT RAnTech Sue McHugh BSc FIAT Terry Priest MBE FIAT RAnTech Trevor Richards BEM MIAT David Spillane FIAT Pete Willan DMS FInstLM MIAT Members of Council Ken Applebee OBE Matthew Bilton Charlie Chambers Steven Cubitt Simon Cumming Andy Cunningham Haley Daniels Glyn Fisher Nicky Gent Cathy Godfrey Alan Graham Linda Horan Sam Jameson Elaine Kirkum Adele Kitching Sarah Lane Theresa Langford Norman Mortell Steve Owen Wendy Steel Allan Thornhill Lynda Westall Carole Wilson Adrian Woodhouse Council Officers Chair Ken Applebee OBE FIAT CBiol FRSB RAnTech Vice Chair Norman Mortell BA Hons MIAT RAnTech Honorary Secretary Linda Horan BSc Hons MIAT RAnTech Honorary Treasurer Charlie Chambers MIAT RAnTech Assistant Treasurer Glyn Fisher FIAT RAnTech Chair Board of Educational Policy Glyn Fisher FIAT RAnTech Chair Board of Moderators Cathy Godfrey FIAT RAnTech Chair Registration Accreditation Board Wendy Steel BSc Hons FIAT RAnTech Chair ATW Editorial Board Jas Barley MSc FIAT RAnTech Bulletin Editor Sarah Lane MSc FIAT RAnTech Assistant Bulletin Editor Carole Wilson BSc MIAT Branch Liaison Officer Lynda Westall BSc Hons FIAT DMS RAnTech EFAT Representative Charlie Chambers MIAT RAnTech Council Website Coordinator Allan Thornhill FIAT RAnTech IAT INFORMATION Animal Welfare Officers and LABA Representatives Andy Cunningham Matthew Bilton Simon Cumming Nicky Gent ATW Bulletin Editorial Board Jas Barley Patrick Hayes Elaine Kirkum Sarah Lane Carole Wilson Lynda Westall Board of Educational Policy Glyn Fisher Chair Steven Cubitt Secretary Board of Moderators Cathy Godfrey Chair Haley Daniels Secretary Moderators Anthony Iglesias Theresa Langford Jenny Parks Communications Group Norman Mortell Chair Elaine Kirkum Teresa Langford Allan Thornhill Lynda Westall Adrian Woodhouse Registration and Accreditation Board Wendy Steel Chair Sarah Lane Secretary Ken Applebee Charlie Chambers John Gregory Cathy Godfrey Stuart Stevenson Carol Williams Observers Charles Gentry Certificate Holders Forum Adrian Deeny LASA Ian Mason Home Office Ngaire Dennison LAVA Kathy Ryder Home Office Lucy Whitfield LAVA Congress Committee Alan Graham Chair Haley Daniels Linda Horan Adele Kitching Allan Thornhill Advertisement Managers PRC Associates Ltd Email mail prcassoc co uk Diversity Officer Haley Daniels IAT OFFICERS MAY BE CONTACTED VIA IAT Administrator admin iat org uk OR VIA THE IAT WEBSITE AT www iat org uk OR VIA THE REGISTERED OFFICE 5 South Parade Summertown Oxford OX2 7JL Although every effort is made to ensure that no inaccurate or misleading data opinion or statement appear in the journal the Institute of Animal Technology wish to expound that the data and opinions appearing in the articles poster presentations and advertisements in ATW are the responsibility of the contributor and advertiser concerned Accordingly the IAT Editor and their agents accept no liability whatsoever for the consequences of any such inaccurate or misleading data opinion statement or advertisement being published Furthermore the opinions expressed in the journal do not necessarily reflect those of the Editor or the Institute of Animal Technology 2017 Institute of Animal Technology All rights reserved No part of this publication may be reproduced without permission from the publisher BRANCH SECRETARIES 2017 Aberdeen Cambridge Edinburgh Hertfordshire Essex Huntingdon Suffolk Norfolk Ireland London Midlands North East England North West Oxford Surrey Hampshire Sussex West Middlesex West of Scotland ii Ms Donna Wallace Ms Fran Flack Ms Janice Young Ms Joanna Cruden Ms Jo Martin Ms Silke Kleefeld Ms Jayne Holby Mr Ian Fielding Ms Rachael Handisides and Ms Joanne Bland Ms Gail Morrissey Mr Adrian Woodhouse Ms Francesca Whitmore Ms Wendy Steel Ms Linda Horan aberdeenbranch iat org uk cambridgebranch iat org uk edinburghbranch iat org uk hertsessexbranch iat org uk hssbranch iat org uk irelandbranch iat org uk londonbranch iat org uk midlandsbranch iat org uk northeastbranch iat org uk cheshirebranch iat org uk oxfordbranch iat org uk shsbranch iat org uk westmiddxbranch iat org uk westscotlandbranch iat org uk

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page ix April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare THE INSTITUTE OF ANIMAL TECHNOLOGY ETHICAL STATEMENT Our purpose is to advance knowledge and promote excellence in the care and welfare of animals in science and to enhance the standards and status of those professionally engaged in the care welfare and use of animals in science Editorial Jas Barley Chair of the Editorial Board Why do I do it It is an odd question to ask yourself at 02 00 when you should be sleeping but the cause of my sleeplessness was ATW Usual problems of not enough material for an issue an editorial to write and not a topic in my head deadlines to meet and several other jobs I should be doing with very little chance of getting to them until this issue is at least with the printers I am supposed to be retired but I seem just as busy as when I fitted all of the above around a more than full time job So why do I do it The simple answer is because I enjoy it It is terrific reading the papers and articles from our members and other contributors especially from some of the younger technicians Seeing the ideas to improve the welfare of the animals development of new technology and reading how you view your careers is extremely satisfying Examples of this are shown in this issue by the inclusion of the essays submitted as part of the AS ET Congress Bursary competition The same topic answered in five quite different ways although all of them have that underlying theme of responsibility for the animals in their charge and the sheer love of the job despite its numerous challenges Bursaries such as the ones provided by AS ET are becoming increasingly important as gone are the days when employers funded all our training and Continuing Professional Development CPD Training budgets have been decreasing over several years and many technologists participate in a lottery as to whether they will be able to attend a course especially those for higher education qualifications It is much too early to judge what the effects of leaving the European Union might be but concerns about the funding of research in the future are already being voiced However thanks to AS ET and its fund raising activities which are supported by many of our trade partners IAT branches and individuals there are now opportunities to gain at least part of the funding for courses etc At the cost of putting pen to paper there are usually two opportunities to win a trip to IAT Congress or the AALAS National meeting in the USA As well as gaining a special bursary you can also add to our CV as ATW publishes as many of the essays as possible Needless to say there is an increasing call for funds so if someone rattles a bucket under your nose at Congress or a branch meeting in aid of AS ET buying a ticket is a small way of giving something back In addition to the AS ET bursary entries I am pleased to be able to publish the winning submission for the Andrew Blake Tribute Award 2017 John Waters from the University of Liverpool is this year s winner with his work along with Professor Jane Hurst and her team to refine the handling of laboratory mice thus reducing stress to the mice Time for change Practicalities of implementing non aversive methods for handling mice describes how the technique has been developed and why the video was produced John has successfully introduced the handling techniques via several meetings and has now produced a video with financial support from the NC3RS to demonstrate the techniques This is being adopted by many institutions both within the UK and internationally The Andrew Blake Tribute Award ABTA is given to Animal Technologists at any level who have made an improvement in animal welfare within their work establishment The award commemorates the life and work of Andrew Blake who suffered from Friedrich s ataxia a hereditary condition described as one of the worst of neurological diseases Andrew died in May 2002 aged 39 Andrew was passionate about the need to support scientists in their work and his commitment to speaking out against animal rights activists took up much of the last ten years of his life We hope to publish other submissions for ABTA in future issues once permission to publish has been received In addition to all of these excellent articles I am pleased to be able to include the second paper from David Simpson on the use of novel cage side recording equipment to investigate the effects of transportation on acclimatisation of rats yes Big Brother is watching Barney Reed from the RSPCA brings us a report on the welfare of wild animals in research A reprinted article from James Cameron courtesy of Talking about Research also demonstrates the love of the job despite some difficult questioning as to why he is involved in this type of work It is obvious that it is not just technologists in the UK that care about their animals ix

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 April 2017 Page 1 Animal Technology and Welfare Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment Rodent Big Brother DAVID SIMPSON Manchester Metropolitan University All Saints Building All Saints Manchester M15 6BH Correspondence david simpson astrazeneca com Extract from a MSc Animal behaviour dissertation Abstract Introduction The transpor tation of animals from supplier to experimental facility is one of the biggest stressors to animals in research Transpor tation unavoidably causes stress and when the animals arrive at the testing facility they require a period of acclimatisation which is not consistently applied within the laboratory animal industry This study investigated the time it takes after transportation for rat behaviour to return to normal levels The parameters investigated in this study were bodyweight behaviour and cage position Rodent Big Brother RBB is a novel system being developed as an automatic monitoring of animal behaviour in rats using an approach to measure activity and temperature in group housed animals This study investigated the acclimatisation period using the RBB system and formed part of the validation of the system Methods Han Wistar rats arrived at the facility after approximately 6 hours of road transportation On arrival the rats were weighed and then group housed three per cage Using Rodent Big Brother RBB the behaviour and location of the rats was recorded 24 hours a day for seven days and bodyweight recorded daily Assessment of the bodyweights and video recordings were conducted to investigate changes in behaviour which could be used to assess acclimatisation to the novel environment Results Bodyweights decreased during transportation but was quickly re gained and reached the pre delivery bodyweights by day 3 however it never returned to the pre delivery growth curve values After arrival day time inactivity decreased this included increased eating drinking and nesting While night time eating reduced during the first two days Night time activity did not stabilise until night five Cage location was well spread during the first day By day two the rats had started to spend more time in the corners of the cage and reduced time in the middle and near the walls of the cage The corners could be seen as the safest location to rest Discussion Although none of these findings were statistically significant graphically the variation and changes on day one can be clearly seen These rats have shown a jetlag response where night time behaviours have been shown during the day time and vice versa These changes could possibly be due to the long period of darkness during transportation The loss of bodyweight would suggest transportation of animals will have a permanent affect but they do achieve a new normal bodyweight growth curve below the pre delivery growth curve after two days The animal inactivity would suggest there is a jetlag period at night time until night five The cage position shows that after an initial day of cage exploration the preferred location in the cage for these rats was in the corners These results would suggest that transportation does affect the rats and at this level of transportation could require six days before behaviours are normalised Studies on shorter and longer distances would be required and a repeat with female rats may also produce different findings The first study phase highlighted several problems with the Rodent Big Brother system lighting and software being the main instigators Using renewed lighting and upgraded software the second study phase was considerably more successful with lost recording greatly reduced RBB is still under development and unable to record automated analysis therefore all observations in this study were recorded manually Key words Animal transportation acclimatisation behaviour rats Rodent Big Brother 1

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 2 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment Introduction The transpor tation of animals from supplier to experimental facility is one of the biggest stressors to the animals 1 2 3 4 5 Transportation unavoidably causes stress in animals 6 For transportation from breeders to test facilities rodents are boxed in cardboard transportation carriers containing sawdust paper bedding food and a gel water pouch The inside of the container is dark which can dramatically affect circadian rhythm 7 8 The animals will be group boxed possibly up to 5 rats per box When the animals arrive at the testing facility they are then confronted with a novel environment 9 10 11 12 which will sound and smell completely different new caging different food possible new cage mates enrichment and different husbandry staff and methods The effects from these stressors have been studied previously and using combinations of different methods blood samples for plasma corticosterone telemetry to measure heart rate and blood pressure 2 13 14 food and water consumption blood glucose 15 bodyweight faecal corticosterone 16 Results from these studies vary on how long acclimatisation should be however three to four days appears to be the most common timeframe Acclimatisation This experiment has been designed primarily to investigate the acclimatisation period of laboratory rats Acclimatisation is an essential part of best practise laborator y experiments which is not consistently applied within the industry Acclimatisation varies between different facilities and can range from one to seven days This is a large difference which could have significant effects on the integrity of scientific work carried out in different laboratories leading to varying conclusions Animal welfare has become the priority for all experiments with animals It has been realised over the last decade improved animal welfare gives better results from studies The quality of life of an animal can actually affect its physiology and therefore any research data Animals on studies will be stressed due to a multitude of reasons 17 18 but it is best practice to minimise these on study as much as practically possible These stresses can affect the outcome of studies if acclimatisation is not considered 19 20 As standard the rats in the facility used for this experiment are transported in temperature controlled vans and take approximately 6 hours to arrive at the facility from the supplier After transportation the animals are placed into a clean individually ventilated cage IVC home cage that contained a variety of environmental enrichment sawdust chew stick sizzle nest and a plastic tube The second section of this experiment is an essential element of the validation sequence of a novel method 2 of recording animal behaviour and body temperature The recording equipment to be used is a prototype of the Rodent Big Brother RBB system RBB has been designed as an automated recording system to monitor rodent activity behaviour and temperature This experiment will be the first to use this innovative equipment Rodent Big Brother Automatic registration of animal behaviour in rats and mice is not a new idea21 but as technology has developed and computers and cameras have got smaller and even lighting has become easier to use thanks to LED lights being available in strips the future of animal experimentation could be changing forever The idea of Rodent Big Brother RBB was first presented at the National Centre of Replacement Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research NC3Rs The NC3Rs have an annual challenge called CRACKIT 22 which is used for scientists to present ideas problems that require solving involving the 3Rs and businesses put forward proposals to attempt to crack the problem The idea of RBB was one of the challenges chosen at the 2011 CRACKIT competition The aim of this challenge was to develop an integrated system which combines measurement of behaviour activity and temperature in rodents that can be used with group housing in home cages and without surgery for twenty eight days Measurement of the activity of individual rats in their home cage provides useful information in studies from basic research through to drug discovery and development Conventional approaches to measuring activity behaviour and temperature in rats are not always compatible with repeat dose toxicology studies The Rodent Big Brother system provides a non invasive unobtrusive technology that can be incorporated into standard home cage racks The system is able to generate positional information and temperature via a subcutaneous radiofrequency identification RFID microchip detected by a base plate reader under the cage Behaviours are captured via side on highresolution video for automated behaviour recognition The development of a non surgical automated approach to measure activity and temperature in animals would avoid the need for surgery or single housing and enable incorporation of additional measurements into existing study types thereby reducing the number of separate studies More broadly this technology could also be used for early identification of animals with subdued activity or changes in body temperature which could be used to improve humane endpoints The RBB is capable of recording 24 hours a day even in complete darkness and is therefore able to record rat behaviour during night time when the animals will be most active It could potentially impact on the welfare of thousands of animals

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 3 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment Method All protocols and experiments were performed under the authority of a valid Home Office Project Licence and conformed to UK Governmental regulations regarding laboratory animal use and care Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 23 Twelve male Han Wistar rats weighing between 300 and 350 grammes were used in this study The rats were housed in threes and kept at a constant room temperature and humidity with a 12 hour light dark cycle light 0600 to 1800 hours From arrival each rat was offered Rat and Mouse 1 E SGC food Diet 2041 Special Diets Services Essex UK and drinking water ad libitum Two cages of animals were recorded on each experimental week and the experiment was repeated four weeks later therefore a total of 4 cages and 12 rats were used on this experiment A week before transportation the animals were surgically micro chipped by the supplier subcutaneously in the left flank with a radiofrequency identification RFID chip supplied by Biomark which is detected by the base plate on RBB These chips give each animal a unique code which can be seen on screen cages Behaviours were captured via side on highresolution video see Figure 2 for an example of images from the RBB system and see RBB setup in Figure 3 The groups of 3 males Hans Wister rats were housed in IVC cages with environmental enrichment which is standard to the facility sawdust chew stick and sizzle nest apart from red transparent plastic tunnels were used so that the rats were visible on the video when inside the tube The RBB system is setup to allow the cages to be located in a standard Tecniplast IVC cage rack Figure 2 Showing night time activity one rat is grooming while the other two play with a chew stick this cage is in complete darkness but LED lights are used to produce the HD pictures Day 1 The animals were placed in transportation boxes at the supplier at approximately 3pm on Monday afternoon These boxes contain food and a jelly water pouch HydroGel and are stored in a temperature controlled holding room until transfer to a van at approximately 4am The van was then driven from Kent to Cheshire which took approximately 6 hours Animals were delivered to the animal holding room at approximately 10am Figure 3 Diagram of RBB recording set up Figure 1 Still shot of rats in home cage showing tail mark on the animal in corner and shows two rats inside red transparent tube in middle of the cage As soon as the cages were placed on the IVC rack the recording equipment was star ted and data was recorded continuously for seven days Bodyweights were recorded daily Day 1 10 00 the animals arrived at the animal holding room in transportation boxes Animals were then health checked body weighed and tail marked see Figure 1 for an example of tail marks with a marker pen to enable identification on video and placed into IVC After collecting the data the video was analysed manually RBB has not been developed to automatically analyse data yet From the start of recording the behaviour activity and location in the cage for each animal was recorded every 30 minutes RBB stored the video in 15 minute clips therefore every other video recording was opened and if that recording was missing the next available recording was observed As soon as the clip was opened the video was paused and the activity and location of each animal was recorded The video was then played to identify tail marks of each animal and to confirm the activity recorded was correct The recordings were observed for behavioural analysis and the following activities annotated inactive seen in Figures 1 13 and 16 drinking grooming seen in Figure 2 and 8 playing seen in Figure 2 eating seen in Figure 8 and 16 sniffing seen in Figure 8 and 3

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 4 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment On Day 1 data was collected from placement in cages at approximately 10 am until 6pm which is when lights go out all other day recordings were recorded from 6am until 6pm and every night recording was recorded 6pm until 6am Each animal was individually recorded and the proportion of time it spent doing each activity and its location was calculated The 3 animals in each cage were then combined together to give the cage total proportion of time for activity and location The proportion of time for each set of results will equal 1 The 4 cages were also averaged to find the mean for each study day The observations were checked for normality using Shapiro Wilk normality test and Bar tlett test of homogeneity of variances and are recorded in Appendix 1 The data for day time light and night time dark was investigated separately As the majority of these behaviours did not follow normal distribution the Friedman rank sum test was performed and is recorded in Appendix 2 The four behaviours of most interest inactive eating drinking and nesting were analysed using Wilcox test to compare any differences in day time and night time activity and are recorded in Appendix 3 Appendix 4 shows the mean and medium recordings for cage location Results Day number Figure 5 Showing the mean bodyweight of the 6 rats in phase 2 of this experiment This graph also shows the expected growth curve of the animals generated by the supplier Figure 5 illustrates the comparison of the bodyweight of animals on this study compared with supplier growth curve this data illustrates the animals used in this study are representative of the standard animals bred by this supplier The mean bodyweight had dropped from 280 g on day 1 to 259 g on day 1 This is a mean bodyweight loss of 21 g 8 over this 24 hour period of transportation The mean bodyweight between days 1 and 2 increases from 259 g to 278 g an increase of 19g 7 Figure 4 shows that by day three all the rats bodyweight has increased above the day 1 weight but never returned to the pre delivery growth curve values Behaviours Bodyweight Bodyweight grams Figure 4 shows the bodyweights for the second group of animals in this experiment the supplier did not record the first batch of bodyweights in error This graph clearly shows that all animals followed a similar Figures 6 to 15 show behavioural activities of all 4 cages recorded during the light cycle and dark cycle Rats would be expected to be inactive during the day and more active during the night as they follow the nocturnal circadian cycle I have selected 4 behaviours from those annotated to display within this report as they showed the most noticeable changes over the seven day acclimatisation from transportation Inactive Day number Figure 4 Showing the bodyweight of the second phase of 6 rats measured daily from day 5 to 1 recorded by the supplier and days one to eight recorded in the facility 4 pattern of bodyweight loss and gain over the 12 days of recording Bodyweight grams nesting seen in Figure 13 The definition of inactive was not moving not performing any other activity this could be asleep or awake usually lying flat or curled up Nesting was defined as making a nest moving or chewing nesting material The animal s location in the cage was also noted This was performed by splitting the cage in to three areas corner wall and middle As illustrated in Figures 6 and 7 there is a difference between day 1 and the subsequent days Figure 6 shows that on day one the rats were least inactive during day 1 The mean inactive proportion of time for day 1 is 0 678 or 68 32 of time the rats were active the other 6 day range from 0 73 to 0 83 active between 17 and 27 of the time Figure 7 shows that on night 1 of recording when the animals should be active they were more inactive a mean of 0 50 active 50 The variance in Figures 7 on day two shows that activity level was variable within the 12 animals with some of the rats still very inactive on night

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 5 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment two with a mean of 0 44 active 56 Night time inactive from night five to night seven shows an inactive mean figure of 0 38 0 38 and 0 39 respectively active 61 to 62 of those nights and data is less variable This data would suggest that normal activity rates commence from night five nights which had means ranging from 0 097 and 0 159 10 and 16 Figure 8 Still image extracted from the RBB recording Example of day 1 recording one rat eating at wall while another rat grooms in the corner The third rat is standing on hind limbs sniffing in the far corner Figures 6 and 7 Show the proportion of time spent inactive for the cages over the seven days recording Figure 6 for day time Figure 7 night time N 4 cage 12 animals Eating Figure 9 demonstrates the proportion of time eating during day one is high and shows a large variability with a mean proportion of time 0 072 7 when compared to other days The means on subsequent days ranged from 0 019 to 0 042 2 to 4 Figure 10 shows eating activity for nights one and two were the lowest of all the nights with a mean proportion of time of 0 075 and 0 062 7 5 and 6 compared to the other five Figures 9 and 10 Show the proportion of time spent eating for the cages over the seven days recording Figure 9 for day time Figure 10 night times N 4 cage 12 animals Drinking Figure 11 shows the proportion of time drinking on day one which shows a large variation and the largest mean 0 035 3 5 compared to the other days which 5

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 6 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment had means ranging from 0 to 0 007 0 to 0 7 Night one on Figure 12 also has the highest mean 0 044 4 which was a little higher than the other days that ranged from 0 024 to 0 035 2 and 3 5 but was not significantly different to other nights Figure 13 One rat is nesting in the middle of the cage another grooming and the third is inactive in the corner Figure 11 Graph showing day time activity drinking of 4 cages over seven days Figure 14 Graph showing day time activity nesting of 4 cages over seven days Figure 12 Graph showing night time activity drinking of 4 cages over seven days Figures 11 and 12 show the proportion of time spent drinking by the cage over the seven days recording Figure 11 for day time Figure 12 night time N 4 cages 12 animals Nesting Figure 14 shows a large variation in the animals on day one but the mean proportion of time of 0 029 2 9 is the greatest of all days as the other days range from 0 to 0 023 0 to 2 3 Night one also had the highest mean of 0 042 4 2 compared to the other nights which ranged from 0 02 to 0 031 2 to 3 1 6 Figure 15 Graph showing night time activity nesting of 4 cages over seven days Figures 14 and 15 show the proportion of time spent nesting by the animals in the cages over the seven days recording Figure 14 for day time Figure 15 night times N 4 cage twelve animals

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 7 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment Cage position Figure 16 Shows a rat in the middle of the cage on its back eating food while the other two are inactive one in the corner while the other is against the wall Corner This data shows the proportion of time spent in the corners of the cage by the rats Figure 17 shows the least period of time in the corners of the cage a mean proportion of time of 0 375 37 5 is on day one This increased by night one to a mean proportion of 0 529 53 all other days and nights followed a similar pattern as night one with means between 0 553 and 0 667 55 and 67 recorded for days and nights two to seven inclusive Figure 18 Graph showing night cage position corner of 4 cages over seven days Wall The data shows the proportion of time spent at the walls of the cage by the rats Figure 19 shows the greatest period of time at the walls of the cage with a mean of 0 363 36 was on day one This decreased by night one to a mean proportion on 0 246 25 all other days and nights continued with the reduction pattern with means between 0 122 and 0 25 12 and 25 recorded for days two to seven and 0 14 and 0 20 14 to 20 for nights two to seven Figure 17 Graph showing daytime cage position corner of 4 cages over seven days Figures 17 and 18 show the proportion of time spent in the corner of the cage by the animals over the seven days recording Figure 17 for day time Figure 18 night time N 4 cages twelve animals Figure 19 Graph showing daytime cage position wall of 4 cages over seven days Figures 19 and 20 show the proportion of time spent next to the wall of the cage by the animals over the seven days recording Figure 19 for day time Figure 20 night time N 4 cages twelve animals 7

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 8 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment Figure 20 Graph showing night cage position wall of 4 cages over seven days Figure 22 Graph showing night cage position middle of 4 cages over seven days Rodent Big Brother Middle This data shows the proportion of time spent at the middle of the cage by the rats Figure 21 shows a similar period of time in the middle of the cage a mean of 0 261 26 on day one and 0 225 22 5 during night one All other days and nights followed a similar pattern apart from day seven with a proportion of only 0 083 8 with means between 0 139 and 0 272 14 and 27 recorded for days two to seven If the equipment had worked correctly during the entire study and recorded 24 hours a day for seven days the RBB would have given 48 observations per animal per day a total of 4032 observations over the two seven day periods or 40 320 minutes of video Each cage of 3 rats should have recorded 1008 observations over the seven day period 10 080 minutes of video Cage 1 missed 63 time points and cage 2 missed 133 this is 6 25 and 13 19 of observations lost on the first study week or a total of 1960 minutes of missed data 630 minutes for cage 1 and 1 330 minutes for cage 2 After the upgrades the missed time points were 25 and 23 for each cage 2 48 and 2 28 or 250 minutes and 230 minutes This is a substantial increase in the amount of data recorded for the second study period an increase of 1 480 minutes of data Considering the amount and quality of data recorded by the system this low level of system dropout is considered to be acceptable and would not impact on the ability to interpret data from studies Discussion Figure 21 Graph showing daytime cage position middle of 4 cages over seven days Figures 21 and 22 show the proportion of time spent in the middle of the cage by the animals over the seven days of recording Figure 21 for day time and Figure 22 night time N 4 cages twelve animals 8 Although these results do not show any statistical significant difference the graphs do show that there are important changes in the bodyweight behaviour and positioning in the cage of animals over the seven days acclimatisation period after transportation This needs to be considered when deciding an acclimatisation period for the start of studies 20 From the data starting study work on day one or two would be seen as inappropriate bodyweights are below prior to transportation behaviours are variable and the rats are still exploring the new environment The loss of bodyweight would suggest transportation of animals will have a permanent affect but they do achieve a new normal bodyweight growth curve below

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 9 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment the pre delivery growth curve after two days This could suggest that it would be possible to start studies after three days acclimatisation 24 15 allowing more time to recover from the bodyweight changes would be sensible rather than as a pool of results A greater sample size would have helped to reduce the variance on some of the days and would have increased the statistical power of the study and changes highlighted here may have been statistically significant The day one positioning split of time is the most even of all seven days within the 3 sections of the cages 38 in corners 36 at the wall and 26 of the time in the middle this is nearly a third of day one spent equally in each area a likely explanation for this distribution is that the rats are examining their new environment 10 9 One other explanation is that in the cages used in this study the food hopper being in the middle of the cage has forced the rats to spend more time in the middle while they eat more food After day one the corners of the cage were the most used area of the cage this could be seen as a home base11 the safest location to rest On a positive side the equipment was easy to use and the study setup was very straightforward Additional improvements have been requested an on screen clock to make it easier to calculate the time the observations take place A comment field so you can see comments that have been entered on to RBB for example study number or compound number An extra addition could be the ability to put a marker in the data during recording This could then be used to see what time the animals receive the dose or other important procedures during the day As the RBB system develops over the coming years and with the addition of automated analysis to its arsenal this type of study would be able to run on hundreds of animals and without the hundreds of man hours required to manually analyse the data would be verified within a few hours Due to this development in technology it will be soon possible to have an alarm or email from a RBB computer to tell a researcher there animals are subdued or displaying abnormal behaviours Being able to know how long it has been since an animal has eaten by the press of a button could soon be here The addition of this novel system to animal research would greatly impact two of the 3Rs Reducing the number of overall studies conducted as behavioural studies could be incorporated into other studies therefore gaining more information from animals on studies and reducing the overall number of animals used RBB can be used to refine studies not only on a scientific level but also for enrichment Patterson Kane et al 2001 25 welfare26 and husbandry levels The most interesting behaviour recorded was inactive which is still visible until night five which would suggest that the acclimatisation period for these rats travelling this distance would be at least five days before recording any data on the animals This would mean if you had pre study measurements they should start five days after delivery of the animals Longer journeys may require longer to recover but would need a study to investigate Other recommended changes could be that the animals are boxed at a more appropriate time the animals should be able to start the night period in the home cage at the suppliers and eat normally before transportation boxing the animals in their containers at midnight and transported to the facility to arrive nearer to 6am so they do not have a 18 hour night period on this day Lights inside the transport boxes that are timed to come on at 6 am could also improve the jetlag effects7 of transportation so the animals keep to a normal light dark cycle and may sleep during the journey reducing physiological stresses In between the first study dates and the second study dates RBB was up graded to increase the standard of results as several time points were missed in the first study due to several technical problems The lighting failed on several occasions and was rewired to prevent this occurring again In addition the computer system was improved as the system crashed on a regular basis and would have to be reset manually during the first seven study days These improvements showed a substantial increase in the amount of data recorded for the second study period Due to the large amount of data collected the small amount of data lost on the second study would not be significant Due to the number of lost data points on study day one the decision was made to pool the animals into cages which reduced the number N of 12 animals to a N of 4 cages If RBB had worked to this high standard on both study weeks it would have been able to use the N of twelve and investigated the animals individually The data collected on this study can be used to compare human observations with the RBB automated analysis In the future RBB would be able to observe all the recordings and would then be able to investigate how accurate taking snapshots of the data is compared to continuous observation The data from this study has highlighted some interesting behaviour changes following transportation and the study design could be used in future studies to investigate other variables As this study was performed using male Han Wistar rats future studies to investigate acclimatisation periods could be performed on female Han Wistar rats or other strains of rats Investigations into different travelling times could also be conducted as well as the use of lights in transport boxes time of day for travelling and even if different ages take longer to acclimatise If RBB does become readily available the animal suppliers could use it to look at behaviours before transportation or even during transit With RBB being developed all this will be available for future studies on mice the species used most in animal research 9

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 10 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment Conclusion Based on the data analysed in this study a five day acclimatisation period after 6 hours of transportation would be suitable prior to putting male Han Wistar rats onto study but it must be remembered that bodyweight may never return to the same place on the growth curve before dispatch Appendix 1 Showing statistical test for normality for behaviours and all cage positions Behaviour Shapiro Wilk normality test Inactive Day Eating Day Drinking Day Sniffing Day Grooming Day Playing Day Nesting Day Walking Day 0 5207 7 899e 05 1 629e 07 0 3308 0 07519 2 608e 06 3 113e 06 0 0001671 Cage position Shapiro Wilk normality test Corner Day Wall Day Middle Day 0 5586 0 09499 0 4534 Bartlett test of of homogeneity of variances 0 5554 0 006905 2 2e 16 0 5403 0 1768 2 2e 16 2 2e 16 0 4626 Behaviour Shapiro Wilk normality test Inactive Night Eating Night Drinking Night Sniffing Night Grooming Night Playing Night Nesting Night Walking Night 0 1927 0 4511 0 05066 0 02715 0 9785 0 05273 0 01067 6 325e 05 Bartlett test of of homogeneity of variances 0 6203 0 6087 0 4184 Behaviour Shapiro Wilk normality test Corner Night Wall Night Middle Night 0 1858 0 6793 0 912 Appendix 2 Showing Friedman rank statistical test for behaviours and all cage positions 10 Behaviour Inactive Day Inactive Night Eating Day Eating Night Drinking Day Drinking Night Sniffing Day Sniffing Night Grooming Day Grooming Night Playing Day Playing Night Nesting Day Nesting Night Walking Day Walking Night Chi squared 8 9189 9 3614 1 8 10 012 8 1951 0 8364 12 4 6627 7 2857 7 0909 6 8182 7 1043 10 6667 5 4968 3 1304 11 5312 Cage Position Corner Day Corner Night Wall Day Wall Night Middle Day Middle Night Chi squared 4 1622 3 6145 6 1081 5 6024 6 2162 9 6145 Friedman rank sum test df 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 6 df 6 6 6 6 6 6 p value 0 1782 0 1542 0 9371 0 1241 0 2242 0 9911 0 06197 0 5877 0 2952 0 3125 0 338 0 3113 0 09924 0 4818 0 7923 0 07328 p value 0 6547 0 7287 0 4112 0 4692 0 3994 0 1419 Bartlett test of homogeneity of variances 0 09938 0 8453 0 4833 0 7055 0 2903 0 9724 0 6348 2 2e 16 Bartlett test of homogeneity of variances 0 01236 0 3561 0 1563

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 11 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment Appendix 3 Inactive Period Day Mean Median Wilcox test P value Day 1 Night 0 678 0 708 0 502 0 498 Day Day 2 Night 0 769 0 778 0 439 0 407 Day Day 3 Night 0 774 0 788 0 415 0 421 Day Day 4 Night 0 825 0 807 0 456 0 447 Day Day 5 Night 0 808 0 813 Day Day 6 Night 0 376 0 794 0 383 0 8056 0 381 0 389 Day Day 7 Night 0 757 0 708 0 385 0 382 16 12 12 16 16 9 12 0 02857 0 05714 0 05714 0 02857 0 02857 0 07652 0 05714 Eating Period Day Mean Median Wilcox test P value Day 1 Night 0 072 0 051 0 075 0 076 Day Day 2 Night 0 028 0 000 0 062 0 051 Day Day 3 Night 0 040 0 043 0 123 0 13 Day Day 4 Night 0 042 0 042 0 132 0 139 Day Day 5 Night 0 035 0 035 0 159 0 151 Day Day 6 Night 0 019 0 028 0 097 0 095 Day Day 7 Night 0 041 0 039 0 101 0 090 6 3 3 0 0 0 0 0 6857 0 3725 0 4 0 0294 0 02857 0 07652 0 05714 Drinking Period Day Mean Median Wilcox test P value Day 1 Night 0 035 0 032 0 044 0 043 7 5 Day Day 2 Night 0 007 0 000 1 0 035 0 032 0 Day Day 3 Night 0 007 0 008 0 04975 0 032 0 026 3 Day Day 4 Night 0 004 0 00 0 359 0 035 0 028 3 5 Day Day 5 Night 0 00 0 000 0 2186 0 028 0 028 2 Day Day 6 Night 0 0 0 038 0 032 1 5 0 06892 Day Day 7 Night 0 005 0 0 024 0 021 1 0 1967 0 09548 Nesting Period Day Mean Median Wilcox test P value Day 1 Night 0 029 0 010 0 042 0 050 Day Day 2 Night 0 007 0 00 6 0 031 0 033 Day Day 3 Night 0 011 0 014 3 0 6573 0 013 0 014 Day Day 4 Night 0 010 0 00 5 0 359 0 024 0 021 Day Day 5 Night 0 014 0 014 4 5 0 8571 0 031 0 021 Day Day 6 Night 0 023 0 027 5 0 3562 0 020 0 028 Day Day 7 Night 0 000 0 00 3 5 0 4419 0 049 0 035 0 0 8248 0 0436 Appendix 4 Corner Period Day Mean Median Day 1 Night 0 375 0 351 0 529 0 542 Day Day 2 Night 0 576 0 583 0 621 0 586 Day Day 3 Night 0 553 0 597 0 656 0 694 Day Day 4 Night 0 652 0 646 0 613 0 632 Day Day 5 Night 0 639 0 652 0 642 0 610 Day Day 6 Night 0 593 0 569 0 648 0 651 Day Day 7 Night 0 667 0 667 0 601 0 611 Wall Period Day Mean Median Day 1 Night 0 363 0 324 0 246 0 264 Day Day 2 Night 0 235 0 194 0 178 0 184 Day Day 3 Night 0 174 0 172 0 205 0 167 Day Day 4 Night 0 122 0 126 0 141 0 139 Day Day 5 Night 0 128 0 118 0 163 0 181 Day Day 6 Night 0 190 0 153 0 167 0 127 Day Day 7 Night 0 250 0 278 0 205 0 188 Middle Period Day Mean Median Day 1 Night 0 261 0 251 0 225 0 199 Day Day 2 Night 0 189 0 178 0 202 0 218 Day Day 3 Night 0 272 0 292 0 139 0 139 Day Day 4 Night 0 226 0 264 0 246 0 270 Day Day 5 Night 0 233 0 243 0 195 0 168 Day Day 6 Night 0 218 0 222 0 185 0 222 Day Day 7 Night 0 083 0 069 0 194 0 194 11

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 12 Investigation of transportation on rat acclimatisation using novel cage side recording equipment Acknowledgements I would like to thank the scientific and technical team Robyn Grant Claire Grant Danny Norrey Victoria Rimmer Tim Lukins Actual Analytics Dave Potts Charles River technicians Lauren Leslie Will Redfern Actual Analytics for taking on the CRACKIT challenge and developing the equipment computer software and data collection technology and the NC3Rs and AstraZeneca for funding the development of RBB and without it none of this would have been possible References 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 12 Foster J C and Meyers N M 1980 Regulator y considerations in the transpor tation of laborator y rodents Lab Anim Sci 30 312 22 Arts J W Kamer R K Arndt S S and Ohl F 2012 The impact of transpor tation on physiological and behavioral parameters in Wistar rats implications for acclimatization periods ILAR J 53 E82 98 Tuli J S Smith J A and Morton D B 1995 Stress measurements in mice after transportation Laboratory Animals 29 132 8 Swallow J Anderson D Buckwell A C Harris T Hawkins P Kirkwood J et al 2005 Guidance on the transport of laboratory animals Laboratory Animals 39 1 39 Arts J Ohl F and Kramer K 2008 Transportation as major life event in rats Effects on welfare and limits of adaptation Measuring Behavior 2008 356 Arts J W Kramer K Arndt S S and Ohl F 2014 Sex differences in physiological acclimatization after transfer in Wistar rats Animals 4 693 711 Van der Meulen A 2014 The effects of switching lightdark regime on the behavior of Wistar rats Utrecht University Masters Thesis http dspace library uu nl handle 1874 289443 Nagano M Adachi A Nakahama K I Nakamura T Tamada M Meyer Bernstein E Sehgal A and Shigeyoshi Y 2003 An Abrupt Shift in the Day Night Cycle Causes Desynchrony in the Mammalian Circadian Center The Journal of Neuroscience 23 6141 6151 Golani I Benjamini Y and Eilam D 1993 Stopping behavior constraints on exploration in rats Rattus norvegicus Behavioural brain research 531 21 33 Russell J C McMorland A J and Mackay J W 2010 Explorator y behaviour of colonizing rats in novel environments Animal Behaviour 79 159 164 Eilam D and Golani I 1989 Home base behavior of rats Rattus norvegicus exploring a novel environment Behavioural brain research 34 199 211 Whishaw I Q Gharbawie O A Clark B J and Lehmann H 2006 The exploratory behavior of rats in an open environment optimizes security Behavioural brain research 171 230 239 Capdevila S Giral M Dd La Torre J R Russell R and Kramer K 2007a Acclimatisation of rats after ground transpor tation to a new animal facility Laborator y Animals 41 255 261 Stemkens Sevens S Van Berkel K De Greeuw I Snoeijer B and Kramer K 2009 The use of radiotelemetry to assess the time needed to acclimatize guineapigs following several hours of ground transport Laboratory Animals 43 78 84 15 Van Ruiven R Meijer G Wiersma A Baumans V Van Zutphen L and Ritskes Hoitinga J 1998 The influence of transportation stress on selected nutritional parameters to establish the necessary minimum period for adaptation in rat feeding studies Laboratory Animals 32 446 456 16 Dahlin J Lam J Hau J Astuti P Siswanto H and Abelson K S 2009 Bodyweight and faecal corticosterone metabolite excretion in male SpragueDawley rats following short transportation and transfer from group housing to single housing Scandinavian Journal of Laboratory Animal Sciences 36 205 213 17 Everds N E Snyder P W Bailet K L Bolon B Creasy D M Foley et al 2013 Interpreting Stress Responses during Routine Toxicity Studies A Review of the Biology Impact and Assessment Toxicologic Pathology 41 560 614 18 Prager E M Bergstrom H C Grunberg N E and Johnson L R 2011 The importance of reporting housing and husbandry in rat research Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience 5 19 Abbott C Small C Sajeda A et al 2006 The impor tance of acclimatisation and habituation to experimental conditions when investigating the anorectic effects of gastrointestinal hormones in the rat International Journal of Obesity 30 288 292 20 Obernier J A and Baldwin R L 2006 Establishing an Appropriate Period of Acclimatization Following Transportation of Laboratory Animals ILAR Journal 47 364 369 21 Van De Weerd H Bulthuis R Bergman A Schlingmann F Tolboom J Van Loo P et al 2001a Validation of a new system for the automatic regisation of behaviour in mice and rats Behavioural processes 53 11 20 22 Burden N Chapman K Sewell F and Robinson V 2015 Pioneering Better Science through the 3Rs An Introduction to the National Centre for the Replacement Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research NC3Rs Journal of the American Association for Laboratory Animal Science 54 198 208 23 Home Office 2014a Guidance on the operation of the Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 https www gov uk government publications operationof aspa 24 Capdevila S Giral M Ruiz De La Torre J L Russell R J and Kramer K 2007b Acclimatization of rats after ground transportation to a new animal facility Laboratory Animals 41 255 261 25 Patterson Kane E G Harper D N and Hunt M 2001 The cage preferences of laboratory rats Laboratory Animals 35 74 9 26 Turner P V Vaughan E Sunohara Neilson J Ovari J and Leri F 2012 Oral gavage in rats animal welfare evaluation J Am Assoc Lab Anim Sci 51 25 30 http www biomark com previewmysite com RFID tags htm http www crackit org uk crack 2011 2011_challenges ch allenge3 rodentbigbrother http www pharmaserv net gel asp http www tecniplast it en product dgm digital readyivc html

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 April 2017 Page 13 Animal Technology and Welfare Report of a RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research BARNEY REED 1 SARAH BEATHAM 1 STEVE CARTER 3 ROS CLUBB 4 KATE GARROD 5 MATT GALE 6 MATT GOMM 2 KATHERINE KNIGHT 5 JULIE LANE 2 FIONA MATHEWS 7 PATRICIA PIMLOTT 6 ADRIAN SMITH 8 RORY WILSON 9 UTE WEYER10 and PENNY HAWKINS1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Research Animals Department RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS National Wildlife Management Centre APHA Sand Hutton York YO41 1LZ National Wildlife Management Centre APHA Woodchester Park Gloucestershire GL10 3UJ Wildlife Department RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS Animals in Science Regulation Unit Home Office Mailpoint A11 12 1st Floor Peel 2 Marsham Street London SW1P 4DF Fera Science Ltd Sand Hutton York YO41 1LZ Hatherly College of Life and Environmental Sciences University of Exeter Prince of Wales Road Exeter EX4 4PS Norecopa c o Norwegian Veterinary Institute PO Box 750 Sentrum 0106 Oslo Norway Swansea University Singleton Park Swansea SA2 8PP APHA Woodham Lane New Haw Addlestone Surrey KT15 3NB Corresponding author barney reed rspca org uk Note the views expressed in this report do not necessarily represent those of the authors or their affiliated organisations Introduction This is a report of a one day meeting jointly convened by the RSPCA and the Animal and Plant Health Agency APHA which brought together around 70 researchers veterinarians animal technologists regulators and others with an interest in the welfare of wild animals used in regulated procedures either in the wild or in captivity The meeting which was held in the UK in September 2015 addressed a range of topics including regulations around the use of wild animals in research reducing the impact of field procedures such as capture and trapping reviewing and reducing the impact of devices used to monitor or track animals refining housing and care when in captivity and assessing welfare The meeting consisted of a series of presentations and discussion sessions PART ONE The first half of the meeting focussed on the use of wild animals in procedures conducted in the field Wild animals and the Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 Update from the Animals in Science Regulation Unit Kate Garrod Home Office The use of wild animals in research raises specific legal ethical practical and animal welfare issues and requires specific justification under the Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 as amended in 2012 ASPA Capture from the wild manipulation for assessment of any existing health conditions and being held in captivity can all cause distress to an animal even before any regulated procedure takes place Regulated procedures themselves then have the potential to cause pain suffering distress or lasting harm as might acts such as restraining handling and marking or otherwise identifying an animal which could be more stressful for wild compared to captive bred animals Finally there are important ethical animal welfare and environmental considerations around 13

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 14 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research whether and how an animal should be released back to the wild As a result of transposing the requirements of the European Directive on the Protection of Animals used for Scientific Purposes 2010 63 there have been a number of changes to the way that the use of protected wild animals for scientific or educational purposes is regulated through ASPA in the UK 1 The Home Office has produced an Advice Note2 to consolidate and update the various existing sources of information and to help those working with wild animals understand some of the additional welfare issues and their legal and ethical obligations under the revised law The Advice Note explains the terms used when working with wild animals in establishments and at other places It also explains when authority under ASPA is required for working with wild animals and highlights situations where authority from other regulators may be needed as well The presentation at the RSPCA APHA meeting focussed on the requirements relating to capture and on the information required in project licence applications proposing the use of animals taken from the wild in regulated procedures Key points included Providing that the method of capture does not cause avoidable pain suffering distress or lasting harm the act of capturing a wild animal for their subsequent or eventual use in scientific procedures is itself not currently considered to be a regulated procedure in the UK unless the process of capture is actually the subject of the scientific study The method of capture and information about its expected immediate impact on animals and likely after effects must be provided within the application for a project licence and will be considered by the Home Office alongside the harmbenefit assessment which considers the justification for animal use Capture of animals must be undertaken by a competent person The project licence holder is responsible for ensuring this Any animal found to be injured or in poor health following capture may not be subjected to a regulated procedure unless and until they have been examined by a veterinary surgeon or other competent person and action has been taken to minimise the suffering of the animal Non veterinarians assessing the condition of captured animals should have under taken appropriate training their competency should be assessed by a veterinary surgeon and they should follow direction from a veterinary surgeon when making decisions about the health of captured animals It would be considered good practice if a record of the training and competency assessment was kept by the establishment s Named Training and Competency Officer in the usual manner 14 Any equipment used should be well maintained and transpor t containers and means of transpor t adapted to the species concerned needs to be available at capture sites in case animals need to be moved for examination or treatment e g either to the establishment where they will be housed or to a place where they can receive veterinary care if necessary A project licence cannot be granted unless the programme of work is designed to enable the regulated procedures to be applied in the most humane and environmentally sensitive manner possible Trapping and removal of animals from the wild or the regulated procedure performed may result in unintended consequences For example removal of an individual animal may cause wider social disturbance or lead to dependent young or eggs being harmed or traps may inadvertently capture or harm non target species These factors along with issues around any impact on endangered species as defined under ASPA the use or release of nonnative species and compliance with the requirements of environmental regulators will also be considered by the Home Office when assessing the harms and benefits of the project Consideration must be given to the potential for and impacts of failure to recapture and remove transmitting or other devices and the effects of such animals entering the human or animal food chain Researchers should also be aware of the consequences and impact that their own presence in the environment may have e g through the possible spread of pathogens or parasites to other study sites via contaminated equipment or damage to fragile habitats They should also have plans for how they will appropriately dispose of anaesthetic drugs e g used in water holding wild caught fish or other substances such as ectoparasiticides used to determine infestation rates in wild caught birds so as not to pollute the environment During the course of a regulated procedure persons involved must take the maximum possible care to safeguard the animal s well being Any animal set free at the end of a procedure must not be at any competitive disadvantage either from the impact of the procedures or simply by the time they have spent in captivity and no additional dangers should be posed to humans other animals or the environment by doing so For more on this issue see the later presentation by Knight along with further relevant Advice Notes from the Home Office 3 4 At the end of regulated procedures there is a requirement for the actual severity experienced by each animal to be recorded and subsequently reported to the Home Office within the Return of Procedures 5

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 15 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research The Advice Note was produced with advice and consultation from individuals and bodies associated with research using wild animals and we hope it will be useful in clarifying the ASPA and helping ensure good welfare and science Any comments and feedback would be welcome at ASRUBusinessSuppor t homeoffice gsi gov uk please put Advice Note Working with animals taken from the wild in the subject field of your email Action points 1 Read the Advice Note and make sure that all relevant staff at your establishment are aware of it this includes Named Persons researchers and members of the Animal Welfare and Ethical Review Body AWERB and any other relevant bodies The Advice Note may also be helpful for equivalent staff in other Member States and the Animal Welfare Body 2 Provide feedback to the Home Office to help identify any areas where more information is needed and to inform future revisions of the Advice Note Best practice in trapping mammals adverse effects and how to avoid them Sarah Beatham and Matt Gomm National Wildlife Management Centre APHA showing escape behaviour In badgers the most likely causes of escape behaviour related injury are usually repeated attempts to dig at the soil through the cage mesh causing abrasion to the forelegs Abnormal behaviours e g unresponsiveness may also sometimes be observed in badgers and on rare occasions broken claws or teeth may be seen These kinds of injuries and levels of stress are obviously highly undesirable and we strive to avoid them wherever possible This includes following best practice guidelines when trapping which should minimise the level of stress that a mammal would be exposed to reduce the frequency of escape behaviour and therefore limit the potential for trap injuries Whilst species specific best practices are still being assessed and developed there are some general principles which should currently be used to minimise stress levels during cage trapping of mammals These include avoid setting traps when poor weather conditions are forecast plan the timing and frequency of checks to minimise the potential time that animals could spend in a trap operate closed seasons when no trapping takes place at all for example where it is not necessary to gather data over winter do not trap badgers between December and April when cubs are most likely to still be dependent on the sows cover traps where possible to provide animals with a heightened sense of security and protection from adverse weather conditions Small mammals are captured using a variety of cage traps for use in research Once caught in traps these animals are very likely to experience stress which can be significant In some cases this can lead to self harm or injury through the performance of repeated escape behaviours Indeed the latter is the most likely cause of trap injuries Once caught in traps mammals may also be exposed to various adverse weather conditions such as rain cold or heat and may be at risk of predation e g crows or rooks may attack trapped rats For these reasons it is very important that careful consideration is given to whether and how to trap animals There are many factors to critically consider including species specific differences in how animals behave and cope with confinement which need to be taken into account when trying to mitigate for and minimise all potential stressors For example trials have shown that rats and squirrels caught in a cage trap will spend most of the first hour displaying escape behaviour Both rats and squirrels may be found with abrasions or cuts on their nose and forehead or with damage to teeth or claws While escape behaviour declines in squirrels over a longer period it remains consistent in rats When caught in a trap for 24 hours rats have been observed to spend over half the time Figure 1 No injuries to squirrels were observed once traps were raised off the ground and cover was provided 15

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 16 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research cover the floor of the trap with a natural material place traps in an environment natural or familiar to the target species e g up in trees for squirrels or near to well used runs for badgers pre bait traps and lock them open so animals are used to feeding within the trap before actually beginning the trapping protocol As an example we reviewed our protocol for trapping squirrels and began placing traps raised off the ground on tree branches and semi covered at least 50 in bin liners which we believe provides a better sense of security for these animals Since this change in the setup Figure 1 no injuries have been found on trapped squirrels Following on from these successful refinements to our trapping procedures we are continuing to review and improve our practice for capture and trapping based on the animals behaviour in the traps and on circumstantial evidence such as areas of damage to traps Our aim is to keep adverse events and avoidable distress to an absolute minimum Action points 1 Initiate a review of trapping practice using records of any injuries damage to traps trap location time of day and year Seek advice on the causes of adverse effects and how these could be prevented or reduced other research groups the regulator and animal behaviour experts may all be able to assist 2 Review the outcomes of any refinements and disseminate good practice to other research groups Animal Welfare and Ethical Review Bodies AWERBs or relevant committees at other establishments doing similar work and within any publications 40 years of collaring badgers lessons from a long term study Steve Carter Andy Robertson and Dez Delahay National Wildlife Management Centre APHA Devices that allow for the radio tracking of animals have revolutionised wildlife studies particularly with respect to species that are cryptic nocturnal or range over large distances Indeed devices that monitor an animal and or the environment they are living in are now widely used around the world Tracking studies to date have involved the use of radio collars backpack or tail harnesses tags attached to the ears or skin or those surgically implanted into the body Tracking devices can map location movement activity and body temperature and more recent technological 16 advances such as GPS and proximity tags even enable the collection of information on the contact that animals have with other identified individuals This has greatly increased the value of the data that can be collected However although ongoing reductions in device size have reduced their impact on animals and data quality has improved there is still potential for animal welfare to be adversely affected 6 7 There are some general principles guiding the attachment of tags on mammals such as recommending tags be no more than 5 of an animal s bodyweight 8 and some excellent regional radio tracking protocols 9 10 However there are no globally agreed standards with respect to good practice that are widely applicable across a range of species During the course of a long term study of badgers at Woodchester Park in Gloucestershire we have developed our own protocols for this species which may also be instructive for the collaring of other terrestrial mammals Since the study s inception in 1975 more than 400 badgers at this site have been radio collared There are particular challenges that need to be overcome when ensuring that collars are correctly sized and fitted for badgers due to their body shape seasonally fluctuating weight rapid growth of cubs and subterranean lifestyle Collars clearly can cause suffering if fitted incorrectly or if poorly designed so careful consideration needs to be given to both aspects In addition general anaesthesia is necessary to fit the collars which itself has the potential to cause adverse effects Therefore the potential benefits of a collaring study need to be clearly understood and justified before initiating the use of radio tags Working closely with manufacturers of tracking equipment we have developed a simple leather collar design using a strip of split rawhide that moulds to the shape of the badger s neck without becoming abrasive but is also capable of carrying a range of monitoring devices from standard VHF transmitters accelerometers and GPS loggers through to state of the ar t proximity devices for recording contacts between individuals However these leather collars are not suitable for carrying heavier GPS transmitters that transmit data via satellite as these devices typically require a continuous metal loop built into the collar In our study we apply simple local working principles that aim to minimise any potential adverse effects of collaring on badgers These are do not collar badger cubs in their calendar year of birth do not collar badgers with existing neck injuries e g from bite wounds do not fit collars that weigh more than 5 of the animal s bodyweight lightly shave guard hairs around the badger s neck to allow a more comfortable fit Figure 2a

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 17 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research when fitted ensure two three fingers can be comfortably inserted between the collar and the neck of the badger Figure 2b but that the collar cannot be easily removed use experienced staff to undertake the collaring or to closely supervise collaring carried out by trainees subtle or long term effects of collaring share with other interested par ties and explore ways to evaluate effects and design projects to identify and monitor potential adverse effects Tracking and telemetry devices on mammals impact of attachment technique and device load Fiona Mathews The Mammal Society a b Figure 2 Collars are fitted under general anaesthetic Guard hairs should be lightly shaven from around the animal s neck to allow for a more comfortable fit a It should be possible to insert two to three fingers between the collar and the neck of the badger but without being able to easily pull the collar over the animal s head b The photos show a badger being collared in the field close to the sett of capture a and within the bespoke sampling facility at Woodchester Park b where the majority of collaring has been carried out Over the 40 year study period substantial refinements have been made to the way the collars are fitted and designed minimising any impact on welfare and enabling the incorporation of novel technology to improve data collection Even the heaviest collar designs currently in use are less than 3 of the average bodyweight of an adult badger in June typically when they are at their leanest During the study mild abrasions or chafing have rarely been obser ved approximately 6 animals along with one instance of a more serious injury where the skin on the neck was broken This par ticular individual was repeatedly recaptured in good health over the next three years so lived to be at least seven years old without any indication of any long term adverse effects In all the above instances the collar was removed immediately Although there have been no obvious observable effects of collaring on the overall condition of the badgers it is acknowledged that there could be more subtle impacts on health and welfare This is an area that is currently under investigation Action points 1 If you are involved in collaring badgers or other large mammals review practice in the light of this section 2 If you have views experience or data relating to Wildlife research in the UK involves a range of wild mammals including dormice voles rats bats squirrels foxes badgers and seals The techniques used to track these animals can also vary from VHF telemetry GPS tagging ringing micro chipping or fur sampling Because such research can include both unregulated procedures and those regulated by the ASPA there is no reliable nationwide data available on how many animals are involved As with any other area of animal use there is a legal and ethical requirement to take every step possible to reduce the numbers of animals involved to the minimum necessary and to minimise the duration and level of any potential suffering During this presentation some of the techniques utilised by those involved in studies using wild mammals were highlighted and some key issues to consider and opportunities available for reducing the impact of external devices on animals were discussed Identification Studies may require the identification of individual animals using a variety of methods As long as the process causes no more than momentar y pain suffering distress and no lasting harm or biological or competitive disadvantage then marking an animal is not considered an ASPA regulated procedure although a Statutory National Conservation Organisation licence may be required for certain species The method of identification used should be carefully considered taking animal welfare practical factors and scientific requirements into account Some commonly used methods are listed below Microchips can be a permanent method but the transponder chip can sometimes migrate within the body of the animal and even the smallest chip may be too large for some species Ringing in mammals is usually confined to bats Rings appear to be well tolerated but it is yet to be evaluated whether carrying a ring has any adverse impacts on factors such as breeding success or predation risk or whether use of an open ring is better than a closed ring The use of rings on types of mammal other than bats is not recommended as this can cause abrasions 17

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 18 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research Collars may be appropriate for certain individuals of some species depending upon size behaviour and morphology but there are associated risks of rubbing abrasions and entanglement as well risks to growing animals Furthermore if the collar does not automatically drop off and the animal cannot be recaptured again for removal then the collar will impose a lifelong burden on the animal and could even prove fatal Tags should generally not represent more than 10 bodyweight in mammals or 5 for those that fly and all possible impacts on locomotory social predator avoidance behaviours etc should be critically considered along with additional implications for animals at certain life stages such as growing animals pregnant animals or those whose bodyweight varies across seasons Clipping an area of fur is minimally invasive but removing fur from an animal particularly if a large area may have a detrimental impact on their ability to thermoregulate Radio tracking Telemetry devices are frequently employed to gather data about an animal s behaviour activity physiological functions or home range size Devices can be attached to an animal in various ways including with glue or as part of a collar or harness There are important species and individual specific factors to consider with each attachment method A glued on tag should fall off after a period of weeks but this cannot always be guaranteed and the process for attachment will require an area of fur to be shaved which can affect thermoregulation as above There could also be an adverse reaction to the glue used Collars offer a longer term option but pose particular difficulties with growing animals and as mentioned previously carr y an associated risk of causing entanglement or rubbing abrasions Both methods require the animal to be trapped and restrained If it is considered to be in the animal s and the handler s best interests for minimising distress or the potential for injury that device attachment is carried out under anaesthesia and if this is practically possible then the animal should be anaesthetised It is unethical and also illegal given the requirement for the method used to not cause avoidable suffering for anaesthesia to be withheld simply to avoid the device attachment process becoming a regulated procedure under the ASPA All potential effects on an animal should be considered and the most refined method used This means thinking about any and all adverse effects associated with trapping e g increased stress injuries caused by escape behaviours handling and restraint stress and distress the physiological burden of carrying the device or tag effect on locomotion energy expenditure bodyweight feeding or social interaction and where applicable the impact on dependent young 18 of the trapped parent while the device is being fitted It is also important to assess the likelihood of tag failure or loss If this is likely there will be implications for the harm benefit assessment as the benefits become significantly less certain to be realised Action points 1 Make no assumptions about the impact of devices or attachment methods on animals research the evidence for current guidelines and review each case according to its specific harms and benefits 2 Ensure that every step is taken to identify and minimise all potential impacts on the animal 3 If the likely benefits to the animal of collaring under general anaesthesia outweigh the potential harms then provide anaesthesia even if this results in the procedure requiring regulation under the ASPA Tags on birds how much are our guidelines flights of fancy Rory Wilson Swansea University Flight is one of the most spectacular features of most birds but it is also considered to be one of the most energetically demanding of their activities only made possible by a suite of radical morphological adaptations As such the attachment of foreign bodies such as tags which effectively change bird morphology is likely to compromise their ability to fly in some way Conventional wisdom advocates that attachment of devices not exceeding 3 or 5 of the bird s bodyweight are acceptable but the reasoning behind this is not clear Given the wide variation in size and shape of birds along with vast species specific differences in the amount of time spent in the air under the water or on the ground and in the characteristics of their flight e g powered flight versus soaring flight fast versus slow or the underwater flight of penguins and auks a one size fits all approach is likely to mean that welfare is at times being significantly compromised It would seem illogical to use exactly the same crude parameter when considering species as varied as hummingbirds pigeons penguins ostriches and condors Whilst the attachment of devices to birds may have a physical effect e g the device may rub the skin or cause feather loss carrying the device may mean that the animal expends more energy due to its weight or the effect that it has on aerodynamic efficiency or it may mean that the animal has more difficulty thermoregulating if feather coverage or quality such as insulation thickness is affected This can impact on the animal s time budgets so that they must spend

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 19 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research longer feeding or searching for food in order to meet the increased energy requirement They will therefore have less time available for essential behaviours such as resting social behaviour or preening to maintain their feather condition A series of examples were provided to highlight the importance of taking into account the species and individual characteristics of a bird when considering the appropriateness of a tracking device For instance increased drag due to a device affects fast flying birds correspondingly more than slow flying species At double the flight speed the drag quadruples which requires eight times the power to overcome this drag The downward force exerted by a tag also depends on the behaviour of the bird For example a 1 gram weight on a bird flying at constant velocity exerts the same force as a 9 gram weight if a g force of nine is experienced by birds such as swifts in flight These effects can be modelled using the work of Professor Colin Pennycuick particularly the books Newton Rules Biology 11 and Modelling the flying bird 12 along with freely available online software13 called Flight 1 24 These resources can help the researcher to identify semi quantifiable metrics for defining the physical detriment incurred by tagged birds by considering factors such as mass drag and the effects of moment arms Effectively modelling such forces should provide clear pointers to indicate when tagging studies might place unacceptable physiological demands on birds and cause significant avoidable suffering Aside from ethical issues such suffering is detrimental to the science as data obtained under such circumstances relate to an animal endeavouring to cope with the challenge of an artificial load rather than representing the actual behaviour or physiology of the species Applying a biomechanical approach to modelling the actual physical and physiological impact of devices on birds should thus provide a more robust basis for predicting the potential harms to individuals used in tagging studies In summary there is a clear need for those researchers using tags on wild animals particularly birds to develop more comprehensive objective methods for calculating the likely impact of device attachment This will help to ensure properly informed decisions on whether how and when it is justifiable to use such devices Action points 1 Critically examine device weight attachment methods and location for tagging studies involving birds 2 If using traditional devices or attachment protocols use the references in this section to model the impact on the birds and factor the results into the harm benefit assessment 3 When using and interpreting previously obtained data from tagging studies e g in the literature take device size location and attachment method into account Re homing and setting free wild animals used in scientific research Katherine Knight Home Office Under the ASPA 1 wild animals can be set free during the course of a series of regulated procedures or at the end of regulated procedures Setting free during the course of procedures is managed through the controls on the Project Licence Re homing or setting free at the end of the procedures requires consent from the Secretary of State As of 1st January 2013 this consent has been required both for wild animals used in regulated procedures and also animals purpose bred kept or supplied for regulated use but then not used Re homing or setting free wild animals is not mandatory under ASPA as ethically animals should only be re homed or set free where it is in the best interests of the welfare of the individual animal There are both ethical and welfare risks associated with releasing into the wild and if necessary animals should undergo a rehabilitation programme that minimises any biological or competitive disadvantage and increases the likelihood of sur vival in the ecological challenges of the natural environment Where it is believed this may not be achieved consideration should be given to re homing the wild animal in captive collection such as a zoo or wildlife sanctuary if their long term welfare can be reasonably assured Consent will only be given for re homing or setting free if the Secretary of State is satisfied that the criteria specified by ASPA section 17A section 3 have been met a that the animal s state of health allows it to be set free or re homed b that the animal poses no danger to public health animal health or the environment c that there is an adequate scheme in place for ensuring the socialisation of the animal upon being set free or re homed d that appropriate measures have been taken to safeguard the animal s well being when re homed or set free In addition before animals that have been taken from the wild can be set free ASPA section 17A 4 also 19

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 20 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research requires that the Secretary of State is satisfied that the animal has undergone a programme of rehabilitation or that it would be inappropriate for the animal to be required to undergo such a programme For example if an animal has only been held for a relatively short period and is unlikely to have lost condition or learned inappropriate behaviours periods to ensure only animals that are likely to adequately adapt to their new home or environment are actually re homed or set free 4 If animals are rehomed or released ensure that they are subsequently monitored as effectively as possible and outcomes used to inform future rehoming or release protocols In order to satisfy the criteria for consent to set free consideration will be given to The animal s state of physical health including any injuries they are carrying any impairments to the senses any risk of them introducing disease The animal s behaviour e g whether they have developed any detrimental stereotypic behaviours whether their ability or motivation to forage has been impaired how likely they are to be able to socially integrate back into their environment or to new surroundings whether they have lost their fear of humans The animal s ability to survive in the wild e g evidence of sufficient body reserves The release habitat and timing of release e g species population distribution sufficient food whether the species would normally be hibernating breeding or migrating inclement weather timing of predator activity Whether there is an appropriate rehabilitation plan that incorporates socialisation to enable hard or soft release to be accomplished Plans in place for post release monitoring or intervention where animals are unable to adjust including the likelihood of being able to recapture the animal If the Secretary of State is satisfied that consent can be given for re homing or setting free then this authorisation may be given in the Establishment Licence within the relevant protocols of the Project Licence or in a letter for the release of the specified individual animal s To assist those working in this area understand their responsibilities the Home Office has produced an Advice Note on Rehoming and setting free 3 which includes and further explains all of the above points Action points 1 Ensure socialisation programmes for wild animals and consideration of rehoming and setting free are embedded throughout the AWERB process 2 If humane killing of animals is the default following the procedures with which you are involved consider whether there are any other options Could you seek advice on rehoming or release taking the animals likely quality of life into account 3 If rehoming or setting free ensure the socialisation programme is fit for purpose and includes review 20 PART TWO The second half of the meeting focussed on the welfare of wild animals captured and taken into captivity for use in studies The care of wild rats stoats badgers and birds in captivity Patricia Pimlott and Matt Gale Fera Science Ltd At Fera a wide variety of wildlife is used in research studies aimed at reducing the conflict between humans and other animals such as population management and assessing the risks of agricultural chemicals In order to properly attempt to meet the needs of wild animals in captivity it is essential to have a good understanding of the species specific ecology and behaviour Good practice for housing husbandry and care for these animals may require different approaches and procedures compared with laboratorybred animals For example CCTV recording is used to better monitor animals and improve our understanding of their experiences in captivity We observed that many of the animals performed Abnormal Repetitive Behaviours ARBs see Clubb overleaf This led us to review and redesign the housing we provide so as to allow a wider range of species appropriate behaviours including climbing nesting foraging and caching food We have also set up a team of Species Experts each of whom has the task of finding out about the biology and behaviour of one of the species in our care and how behavioural and physiological needs can best be provided for in captivity The remit of a Species Expert is quite broad and includes approving the care and welfare provisions for the wild animals being brought into captivity reviewing the number and purpose of animals being kept and used trialling and assessing environmental enrichment acting as a key point of liaison contact and information for staff and the AWERB and disseminating knowledge and advances in understanding externally at relevant conferences and meetings

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 21 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research Together these actions have enabled us to learn from experience how to improve the environment of each species to reduce the animals stress and anxiety levels thus improving health welfare and scientific results Rats Some wild mammals may have to be singly housed as a study requirement e g if males cannot be kept together harmoniously or if keeping a male and female together could result in an unwanted pregnancy This is likely to be a significant welfare issue for social animals such as rats To attempt to ameliorate the stress of single housing by providing a more stimulating environment we have worked with manufacturers to design an improved multi level rat cage which allows for a degree of choice within the environment It also enables animals to be exposed to and become familiar with experimental equipment prior to procedures reducing neophobia and improving ease of capture Birds Fera has experience of working with many different bird species including sparrows and crows We have improved the care of different wild birds by enriching aviaries during the acclimatisation period and in longterm accommodation This has included the provision of nest building materials and boxes see Figure 4 perches in a range of different diameters which helps maintain foot condition hides and cover to escape adverse weather and water and dust baths for promoting natural behaviours and maintaining feather condition We provide a variety of species appropriate food types such as dog food biscuits beef mince humanely killed chicks or rats and eggs for carrion crows and wild bird seed millet fat balls mealworms and fine grit for sparrows and encourage the animals to work for their food by scatter feeding hiding food or using puzzle feeders Stoats Stoats can hold large territories in the wild and need space for exploration though they do not like to be exposed in the open without cover We have recently been trialling new housing in an external pen This has allowed for a larger enclosure size and provided additional opportunities for us to hide food and for the animals to cache it Different bedding materials and food items are also being trialled Badgers We enrich the environment see Figure 3 of these animals by providing areas of grass and mud to dig wooden nest boxes with straw plastic paddling pools or containers with water and plastic tunnels and other 3dimensional apparatus e g ramps around the pen that improves animals opportunity to explore and exercise We also now use CCTV to help monitor the activity feeding and general well being of the badgers which is especially useful for observing them at night Figure 4 Nest box for a Carrion crow Action points 1 Consider initiating a Species Experts programme at your facility including researching biology and behaviour and evaluating the impact of refinements to husbandry and care 2 The idea of Species Experts need not be confined to wild animals consider taking the same approach for conventional laboratory animals Bats birds and boar assessing welfare in wild species Julie Lane National Wildlife Management Centre APHA All human interactions with animals have the potential to cause stress and behavioural or physiological changes This is particularly so for wild animals 14 where any kind of direct interaction is highly likely to be perceived as a threat Figure 3 Enclosure for housing badgers Stress is an unavoidable and integral part of all animals lives and there are many mechanisms for 21

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 22 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research coping with both psychological and physical stressors However acute or prolonged stress and distress can have wide ranging significant and detrimental effects on the psychological and physiological health of animals In the case of field studies it is difficult to detect the onset of these stress related effects because the animals are usually released into the wild before any indicators are apparent Releasing animals whose health and welfare may subsequently be compromised is highly undesirable and should be avoided whenever possible It is essential therefore to tr y to determine some reliable appropriate and accurate indicators of animal welfare which can be used in these limited circumstances So which indicators can be used to assess stress in wild animals It has been established for nearly half a century that stressful experiences cause the synthesis and release of the glucocorticoids cortisol and or cor ticosterone from the adrenal gland These hormones have traditionally been measured by sampling the blood a process which requires restraint and in some cases anaesthesia Both of these not only have potential welfare effects on the animal but are stressful in themselves so can affect the integrity of the data collected Non invasive measures of physiology and behaviour would therefore be the ideal choice for assessing welfare from both practical and ethical standpoints We have coupled behavioural monitoring and noninvasive sampling to assess levels of glucocorticoids in a wide variety of wild species and have been able to use these measures to monitor stress levels in animals in situations that would have rendered more traditional methods impossible For example we have used faecal cortisol to assess stress in wild rabbits in different types of housing and the stress experienced by wild rats caught in cage traps Techniques to measure glucocorticoids are becoming more sophisticated This is enabling ver y small concentrations of these hormones to be measured accurately in animal by products such as hair which can be collected without the animal s knowledge In many circumstances non invasive glucocor ticoid measurement15 can give an accurate and important insight into the welfare status of an individual or a group of animals without causing distress or detrimental effects which can be a useful tool for the wildlife researcher seeking to monitor and reduce adverse effects Action points 1 Remember that all interactions with humans will be stressful for wild animals in many cases it will be interpreted as a close encounter with a predator 2 Ensure that stress is adequately assessed before 22 animals are released and that they have the opportunity to recover 3 Keep up to date with the literature on non invasive techniques for assessing stress evaluating these and correlating them with other indicators wherever they may afford new insights into the animal s welfare state Stereotypies in the captive environment Ros Clubb RSPCA Stereotypic behaviours are a subtype of Abnormal Repetitive Behaviours ARBs a diverse group of oddlooking behaviours found in captive animals ARBs are very repetitive consistent in terms of the pattern or apparent goal of the behaviour and either appear to serve no function or are maladaptive harmful or inappropriate Examples include repetitive routetracing somersaulting digging bar mouthing barbering and spot pecking In the case of stereotypic behaviours the cause is known to be either the frustration of natural behaviour patterns repeated attempts to cope with a problem and or impaired functioning of the brain Commonly seen in captive wild animals considerable effort is devoted to trying to reduce or eradicate stereotypies most often through environmental enrichment and ideally to stop them developing in the first place This is because stereotypies have been linked to poor animal welfare and indicate an underlying problem Stereotypies are virtually never seen in freeliving wild animals they typically develop in barren unstimulating environments that prevent animals per forming highly motivated behaviours their performance is typically increased by bad experiences and decreased by good experiences and the stereotypies themselves can be harmful That said the link with welfare is not always straightfor ward stereotypies may actually help animals cope with poor environments and so animals who do not perform stereotypies may actually be worse off Aside from the animal welfare implications stereotypies can also interfere with the goals of research studies not least because they can indicate the animal under study is not normal The goal of any captive animal husbandry system should always be to have no animals displaying stereotypies Research may be lacking to clarify whether an ARB is a true stereotypy i e it reflects an underlying problem in which case it is safer to assume it is so that necessary steps can be taken If ARBs do appear steps should always be taken to try to reduce their frequency and prevalence but this should never

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 23 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research involve blocking or preventing their performance e g by placing objects in the path of route tracing animals as the behaviour may be helping them to cope with an inadequate environment Steps that can be taken to prevent or reduce the performance of ARBs include Environmental enrichment that encourages the performance of highly motivated natural behaviours Minimising potentially distressing experiences Maximising the reliability of signals and cues for events especially stressful experiences such as cage cleaning or restraint Making the timing of the daily routine less predictable if possible e g feeding routine feeding locations enrichment regime Finally it is important to remember that the absence of ARBs does not mean that an animal automatically has good welfare It may be that animals not displaying ARBs are actually suffering more but do not have an outlet or coping mechanism to express that frustration This reinforces the importance that people must have a very good understanding of the animals at species breed strain and individual level they are using or caring for to avoid suffering going undetected and untreated Action points 1 Take any incidences of ARBs including stereotypic behaviour seriously It should always lead to a review of housing husbandry and care with advice from a veterinarian animal behaviour scientist or others with appropriate expertise 2 Obtain expert advice on all of the above bullet points and set out a programme to ensure that these are acted upon 3 If stereotypies occur do not simply prevent the animal from performing them aim to tackle the underlying cause 4 Be aware that animals who are not stereotyping are not necessarily in a good welfare state For example an animal that is not stereotyping may instead spend its time hiding in the nest box because it is too afraid to leave or is in a depressed like state Guidelines and resources for those using or caring for wild animals in research Adrian Smith Norecopa Guidelines for good practice in any area of animal research including wild animal care and use can be difficult to find as they are often published singly alongside mainstream research papers in scientific journals Recognising this Norecopa held a consensus meeting on the Harmonisation of the Care and Use of Animals in Field Research 16 A list of available guidelines17 was presented and areas were suggested for further work 18 The par ticipants then published a consensus statement19 giving their opinion on the strengths and weaknesses of wildlife research including a list of tasks to improve the situation This statement provides in itself useful guidelines for the way ahead The implementation of EU Directive 2010 63 which includes specific provisions for wildlife research should act as an incentive for more work on the welfare of wild animals This has for example been the case for severity classification where there are now specific guidelines for this work in fish20 but none so far have been written for other wild animals However many of the remarks made in the fish guidelines can be applied to wildlife For example Many procedures that are commonly performed on terrestrial laboratory animals have very different welfare implications when applied to wildlife Wild animals are a heterogeneous group with extreme biological variation and we have limited understanding of the welfare requirements of many of these species A recent Norwegian expert committee report on risk assessment and welfare of wild mammals and birds subjected to marking 21 and a subsequent public hearing on the subject indicated an additional challenge the need for guidelines produced by and for regulators and researchers when processing applications for wildlife research to ensure consistency and for close cooperation between regulators and those funding such work An electronic collection of currently available databases guidelines information centres journals and discussion groups of relevance to the 3Rs has been available since 2014 see Box 1 The 3Rs Guide database which is a collaboration between the US Department of Agriculture and Norecopa has recently been brought up to date and includes a comprehensive list of guidelines for wildlife research There is a real need to continue drawing together and publishing species specific guidelines for wild animals in research for further efforts to improve the quality of research undertaken and for regulators to provide clear and detailed guidance on their expectations Action points 1 Ensure that there has been an effective search for all relevant guidelines when capturing handling housing and caring for wild animals and using them in research 23

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 24 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research 2 If you identify any unmet needs with respect to guidelines consider initiating a process to produce some Box 1 3R Guide database 2016 Guidelines for wildlife research http norecopa no search fq cat 22Wildlife 22 fq type 22Guidelines 22 fq db 223r 2 2 sort name_s 20asc q accessed 10 June 2016 Harmonisation of the Care and Use of Animals in Field Research Consensus meeting Gardermoen Nor way 21 22 May 2008 http norecopa no meetings wildlife 2008 accessed 10 June 2016 Hawkins P 2008a Guidelines for wildlife research http norecopa no media 7433 hawkinswildlife guidelines pdf accessed 10 June 2016 Hawkins P 2008b Guidelines for wildlife research what do we have and what is missing http norecopa no media 6152 37hawkins pdf accessed 10 June 2016 A guide to the care and use of Australian native mammals in research and teaching 2014 h t t p s w w w n h m r c g o v a u g u i d e l i n e s publications ea29 accessed 10 June 2016 Hawkins P Dennison N Goodman G Hetherington S Llywelyn Jones S Ryder K and Smith A J 2011 Guidance on the severity classification of scientific procedures involving fish report of a Working Group appointed by the Nor wegian Consensus Platform for the Replacement Reduction and Refinement of animal experiments Norecopa Laborator y Animals 45 219 224 http lan sagepub com content 45 4 219 full accessed 10 June 2016 Hoel K Barrett R T B e K E Lydersen C and Swenson J E 2013 Risk assessment concerning the welfare of certain free ranging wild mammals and birds subjected to marking Report from an expert committee appointed by the Norwegian Scientific Committee for Food Safety http www vkm no dav a0c6dfa615 pdf accessed 10 June 2016 Smith A J and Allen T 2005 The use of Databases Information Centres and Guidelines when planning research that may involve animals Animal Welfare 14 4 347 359 made available with permission http norecopa no media 6688 smithallen pdf accessed 10 June 2016 24 Acknowledgements Many thanks to all the speakers and delegates for the talks and discussions We are also grateful to the staff at the Animal Plant and Health Agency who helped organise and host the event References 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Home Office 2014a Guidance on the operation of the Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 https www gov uk government publications operationof aspa accessed 10 June 2016 Home Office 2016 Advice Note Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 Working with animals taken from the wild Available at https www gov uk government uploads system uploads attachment_data file 535574 working with wild animals 160706 pdf accessed 07 July 2016 Home Office 2015a Advice Note Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 Re homing and setting free of animals Available at https www gov uk government uploads system uploads attachment_data file 470146 Advice_Note_Rehoming_setting_free pdf accessed 4 January 2016 Home Office 2015b Advice Note Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 Use Keeping Alive and Re Use Available at https www gov uk government uploads system uploads attachment_data file 470008 Use_ Keeping_Alive_and_Re use_Advice_Note pdf accessed 4 January 2016 Home Office 2014b Advisory notes on recording and reporting the actual severity of regulated procedures https www gov uk government uploads system uploads attachment_data file 276014 NotesActual SeverityReporting pdf accessed 10 June 2016 Kenward R E 2001 A manual for wildlife radio tagging Academic Press London Joint Working Group on Refinement 2003 Refinements in telemetry procedures Laboratory Animals 37 261299 Available at http lan sagepub com content 37 4 261 full pdf accessed 10 June 2016 Macdonald D W 1978 Radio tracking some applications and limitations In Animal Marking Recognition Marking of Animals in Research B Stonehouse ed pp 192 204 London Macmillan Ministry of Environment Lands and Parks Resources Inventory Branch for the Terrestrial Ecosystems Task Force Resources Inventory Committee 1998 Wildlife Radio telemetry Standards for components of British Columbia s Biodiversity No 5 Resources Inventor y Committee The Province of British Columbia Mech L D and Barber S M 2002 A Critique of Wildlife Radio Tracking and its Use in National Parks A Report to the US National Park Service Jamestown ND US Geological Survey Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Centre Pennycuick C J 1992 Newton rules biology a physical approach to biological problems Oxford University Press ISBN 0198540205 Pennycuick C J 2008 Modelling the flying bird Elsevier ISBN 9780123742995 Flight 1 24 software available at http www bristol ac uk biology people colin jpennycuick index html accessed 4 January 2016

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 25 Report of an RSPCA APHA meeting on the welfare of wild animals used in research 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 Lane J and MacDonald R 2010 Chapter 7 Welfare and Best Practice in Field Studies of Wildlife p 92 106 In UFAW Handbook on the Care and Management of Laboratory and Other Research Animals 8th Edition Wiley Lane J 2006 Can non invasive glucocor ticoid measures be used as reliable indicators of stress in animals Animal Welfare 15 4 331 342 Norecopa 2008a Harmonisation of the Care and Use of Animals in Field Research Consensus meeting Gardermoen Nor way 21 22 May 2008 http norecopa no meetings wildlife 2008 accessed 10 June 2016 Hawkins P 2008a Guidelines for wildlife research http norecopa no media 7433 hawkins wildlifeguidelines pdf accessed 10 June 2016 Hawkins P 2008b Guidelines for wildlife research what do we have and what is missing http norecopa no media 6152 37hawkins pdf accessed 10 June 2016 Norecopa 2008b Harmonisation of the Care and Use of Animals in Field Research 2008 A Consensus Document from the participants http norecopa no media 6132 24consensus pdf accessed 10 June 2016 Hawkins P Dennison N Goodman G et al 2011 Guidance on the severity classification of scientific procedures involving fish report of a Working Group appointed by the Norwegian Consensus Platform for the Replacement Reduction and Refinement of animal experiments Norecopa Laboratory Animals 45 219 224 Available by permission from http norecopa no otherresources severity classification accessed 10 June 2016 Hoel K Barrett R T B e K E Lydersen C and Swenson J E 2013 Risk assessment concerning the welfare of certain free ranging wild mammals and birds subjected to marking Report from an expert committee appointed by the Norwegian Scientific Committee for Food Safety http www vkm no dav a0c6dfa615 pdf accessed 10 June 2016 25

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 27 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare PAPER SUMMARY TRANSLATIONS INHALTVERZEICHNIS Untersuchung des Einflusses des Transports von Ratten auf ihre Akklimatisierung mittels eines neuartigen Aufzeichnungsger ts neben dem K fig Rodent Big Brother DAVID SIMPSON Manchester Metropolitan University All Saints Building All Saints Manchester M15 6BH Gro britannien Korrespondenz david simpson astrazeneca com Auszug aus einer MSc Dissertation ber Tierverhalten Abstract Einleitung Der Transport vom Lieferanten zur Versuchseinrichtung ist einer der gr ten Stressfaktoren f r Versuchstiere Transport verursacht unweigerlich Stress und die Tiere ben tigen bei der Ankunft in der Versuchseinrichtung eine Akklimatisierungsphase die jedoch in der Tierlaborbranche nicht konsequent gew hrleistet wird Im Rahmen dieser Studie wurde die Zeit nach dem Transport von Ratten untersucht die erforderlich ist ehe sich bei ihnen wieder normale Verhaltensmuster einstellen Die Studie untersuchte die Parameter K rpergewicht Verhalten und Aufenthaltsort im K fig Rodent Big Brother RBB ist ein neuartiges System zur automatischen berwachung von Rattenverhalten und zur Messung von Aktivit t und Temperatur von in Gruppen gehaltenen Tieren Diese Studie untersuchte den Akklimatisierungszeitraum mithilfe des RBB Systems und war Teil der Validierung des Systems Methoden Wistar Han Ratten trafen nach etwa 6 st ndigem Stra entransport in der Einrichtung ein Bei der Ankunft wurden sie gewogen und dann in Gruppen zu je drei Tieren pro K fig untergebracht Mittels Rodent Big Brother RBB wurden Verhalten und Aufenthaltsort der Ratten 7 Tage lang rund um die Uhr erfasst Ihr K rpergewicht wurde t glich gemessen Die Bewertung von K rpergewicht und Videoaufzeichnungen erfolgte zwecks Untersuchung von Verhaltens nderungen die zur Festlegung eines Akklimatisierungszeitraums in der neuen Umgebung dienen k nnten Ergebnisse Das K rpergewicht ging w hrend des Transports zur ck stieg aber rasch wieder an und erreichte bis zum Tag 3 die vor dem Transport gemessenen Werte Die vor der Lieferung erfassten Wachstumskurvenwerte stellten sich jedoch nicht wieder ein Nach der Ankunft wurde tags ber ein R ckgang der Inaktivit t verzeichnet die zunehmende Futter und Fl ssigkeitsaufnahme sowie Nisten beinhaltete Die n chtliche Futteraufnahme ging in den ersten beiden Tagen zur ck und die n chtliche Aktivit t stabilisierte sich erst wieder ab der f nften Nacht Die Position im K fig variierte am ersten Tag vielfach Am zweiten Tag begannen die Ratten mehr Zeit in den Ecken des K figs und weniger Zeit in der Mitte und an den Seiten des K figs zu verbringen Die Ecken d rften somit von ihnen als sicherster Ruheplatz empfunden werden 27

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 28 Paper Summary Translations Diskussion Auch wenn keine dieser Erkenntnisse statistische Signifikanz hat lassen sich Variationen und Ver nderungen am ersten Tag eindeutig grafisch darstellen Diese Ratten zeigten eine Jetlag Reaktion bei der n chtliche Verhaltensweisen tags ber auftraten und umgekehrt Diese Ver nderungen d rften auf die lange Zeit der Dunkelheit w hrend des Transports zur ckzuf hren sein Der Gewichtsverlust d rfte auf eine dauerhafte Auswirkung von Tiertransporten hindeuten Die Tiere weisen nach zwei Tagen jedoch eine neue normale Gewichtszunahmekurve auf unterhalb der Wachstumskurvenwerte vor der Lieferung Die Inaktivit t der Tiere d rfte auf eine Jetlag Phase bis zur f nften Nacht hindeuten Die Position im K fig zeigt dass diese Ratten nach dem ersten Tag der K figerkundung die Ecken als bevorzugten Aufenthaltsort w hlten Diese Ergebnisse d rften darauf hindeuten dass sich der Transport sehr wohl auf die Ratten auswirkt und sie bei diesem Transportumfang 6 Tage ben tigen k nnten ehe sich ihr Verhalten wieder normalisiert Es w ren Studien zu k rzeren und l ngeren Entfernungen n tig und bei einer Wiederholung mit weiblichen Ratten w rden m glicherweise ebenfalls andere Erkenntnisse gewonnen Die erste Studienphase zeigte verschiedene Probleme mit dem Rodent Big Brother System auf wobei Beleuchtung und Software im Mittelpunkt standen Dank verbesserter Beleuchtung und aktualisierter Software war die zweite Studienphase wesentlich erfolgreicher und Aufzeichnungsverluste konnten betr chtlich reduziert werden Mit dem RBB System das sich noch in der Entwicklung befindet kann noch keine automatisierte Analyseaufzeichnung erfolgen sodass s mtliche Beobachtungen in dieser Studie manuell erfasst wurden Schlagw rter Tiertransport Akklimatisierung Verhalten Ratten Rodent Big Brother 28

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 29 Paper Summary Translations Bericht ber eine RSPCA APHA Tagung zu Schutz und Wohlbefinden von in der Forschung verwendeten Wildtieren BARNEY REED 1 SARAH BEATHAM 2 STEVE CARTER 3 ROS CLUBB 4 KATE GARROD 5 MATT GALE 6 MATT GOMM 2 KATHERINE KNIGHT 5 JULIE LANE 2 FIONA MATHEWS 7 PATRICIA PIMLOTT 6 ADRIAN SMITH 8 RORY WILSON 9 UTE WEYER10 und PENNY HAWKINS1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Research Animals Department RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS Gro britannien National Wildlife Management Centre APHA Sand Hutton York YO41 1LZ Gro britannien National Wildlife Management Centre APHA Woodchester Park Gloucestershire GL10 3UJ Gro britannien Wildlife Department RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS Gro britannien Animals in Science Regulation Unit Home Office Mailpoint A11 12 1st Floor Peel 2 Marsham Street London SW1P 4DF Gro britannien Fera Science Ltd Sand Hutton York YO41 1LZ Gro britannien Hatherly College of Life and Environmental Sciences University of Exeter Prince of Wales Road Exeter EX4 4PS Gro britannien Norecopa c o Norwegian Veterinary Institute PO Box 750 Sentrum 0106 Oslo Norwegen Swansea University Singleton Park Swansea SA2 8PP Gro britannien APHA Woodham Lane New Haw Addlestone Surrey KT15 3NB Gro britannien Correspondance barney reed rspca org uk Einleitung Der vorliegende Bericht behandelt ein eint giges Meeting das gemeinsam von der RSPCA und der Animal and Plant Health Agency APHA einberufen wurde und an dem rund 70 Forscher Tier rzte Tiertechniker Mitarbeiter von Regulierungsstellen und andere Personen mit Interesse am Schutz von Wildtieren teilnahmen die f r kontrollierte Verfahren in der Wildnis oder in Gefangenschaft verwendet werden Die Tagung die im September 2015 in Gro britannien stattfand befasste sich mit verschiedenen Themen wie Regulierung der Nutzung von Wildtieren in der Forschung Reduzierung der Auswirkungen von Feldverfahren wie Fangen und Fallenstellen berpr fung und Reduzierung der Auswirkungen von Ger ten zur berwachung oder Verfolgung von Tieren Verbesserung ihrer Unterbringung und Pflege in Gefangenschaft und Bewertung des Tierschutzes Das Meeting umfasste eine Reihe von Pr sentationen und Diskussionsrunden In der ersten H lfte stand der Einsatz von Wildtieren in vor Ort durchgef hrten Verfahren im Mittelpunkt w hrend es in der zweiten H lfte vorwiegend um Fragen des Schutzes und Wohlbefindens von f r Studienzwecke gefangenen und in Gefangenschaft gehaltenen Wildtieren ging Schlagw rter Tierschutz Wildtiere Fangen Fallenstellen Refinement 29

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 30 Animal Technology and Welfare April 2017 CONTENU DE LA REVUE Enqu te sur le transport des rats et analyse de leur acclimatation l aide de nouveaux quipements d enregistrement suppl mentaires au sein des cages Rodent Big Brother DAVID SIMPSON Manchester Metropolitan University All Saints Building All Saints Manchester M15 6BH Correspondance david simpson astrazeneca com Extrait d un m moire de master sur le comportement animalier R sum Introduction Le transport des animaux depuis le fournisseur jusqu aux installations exp rimentales repr sente l un des plus importants facteurs de stress chez les animaux utilis s des fins de recherche Le transport est in vitablement une source de stress et lorsque les animaux arrivent au centre de test ils ont besoin d une p riode d acclimatation qui n est pas toujours respect e dans le secteur des laboratoires animaliers Cette tude examine le temps n cessaire apr s le transport pour que le comportement des rats retourne des niveaux normaux Les param tres analys s dans cette tude sont le poids corporel le comportement et les emplacements favoris au sein des cages Rodent Big Brother RBB est un nouveau syst me actuellement d velopp pour effectuer une surveillance automatique du comportement des rats dans le cadre d une approche consistant mesurer l activit et la temp rature des animaux log s en groupe Cette tude a examin la p riode d acclimatation en utilisant le syst me RBB et faisait partie du processus de validation du syst me M thodes Les rats Han Wistar sont arriv s au centre de test apr s environ 6 heures de transport par route leur arriv e les rats ont t pes s puis plac s dans des cages par groupes de trois Le syst me Rodent Big Brother RBB a permis d enregistrer le comportement et les d placements des rats 24 heures sur 24 et 7 jours sur 7 et de mesurer chaque jour leur poids corporel Une valuation des masses corporelles et des enregistrements vid o a t r alis e afin d analyser tout changement de comportement qui pourrait tre utilis pour d terminer l adaptation des rats leur nouvel environnement R sultats Le poids corporel a diminu au cours du transport mais a rapidement t repris pour atteindre au bout du troisi me jour les chiffres qui avaient t enregistr s avant le transport Il a toutefois t impossible de retrouver les valeurs de la courbe de croissance qui avaient t observ es avant le transport Apr s l arriv e des rats on a constat en journ e une baisse de leur inactivit et une augmentation de la quantit de nourriture et de boisson consomm e ainsi qu une hausse de la nidification l inverse la quantit de nourriture consomm e la nuit a chut au cours des deux premiers jours L activit nocturne ne s est stabilis e que lors de la cinqui me nuit Les d placements effectu s dans la cage taient assez bien r partis au cours de la premi re journ e Au bout du deuxi me jour les rats ont commenc passer plus de temps dans les coins de leur cage et moins de temps au milieu et pr s des cloisons Les coins peuvent tre interpr t s comme tant l emplacement le plus s r pour se reposer Discussion Bien qu aucune de ces observations ne f t statistiquement significative graphiquement parlant les variations et les changements apparus au cours de la premi re journ e ressortent clairement Les rats ont souffert du d calage horaire un tat qui s est manifest par la pr sence de comportements nocturnes en journ e et 30

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 31 Paper Summary Translations inversement Ces changements pourraient tre expliqu s par la longue p riode d obscurit qu ils ont subie lors du transport La perte de poids corporel laisse penser que le transport des animaux aura un effet permanent mais ces derniers pr sentent au bout de deux jours une nouvelle courbe de croissance de la masse corporelle normale dont les valeurs sont toutefois inf rieures celles de la courbe de croissance enregistr e avant le transport L inactivit des animaux laisse penser que ces derniers souffrent d un d calage horaire la nuit jusqu la cinqui me nuit Les d placements observ s montrent qu apr s avoir pass la premi re journ e explorer leur cage les rats ont finalement choisi les coins comme emplacements pr f r s Ces observations sugg rent que le transport affecte bel et bien les rats et que 6 jours peuvent tre n cessaires avant de retrouver des comportements normaux Il serait utile de r aliser des analyses portant sur de plus longues ou plus courtes distances de transport et d effectuer une tude sur des femelles qui pourrait produire des r sultats diff rents La premi re phase de cette tude a mis en avant plusieurs probl mes li s au syst me Rodent Big Brother notamment concernant l clairage et le logiciel utilis Apr s avoir install un nouvel clairage et mis jour le logiciel informatique la deuxi me phase de l tude fut beaucoup plus encourageante puisque le nombre de donn es enregistr es perdues a t consid rablement r duit RBB est toujours en cours de d veloppement et ne permet actuellement pas d enregistrer une analyse automatis e Toutes les observations mises lors de cette tude ont par cons quent t enregistr es manuellement Mots cl s Transport animalier acclimatation comportement rats rodent big brother 31

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 32 Paper Summary Translations Rapport de r union entre la RSPCA et l APHA sur le bien tre des animaux sauvages utilis s des fins de recherche BARNEY REED 1 SARAH BEATHAM 2 STEVE CARTER 3 ROS CLUBB 4 KATE GARROD 5 MATT GALE 6 MATT GOMM 2 KATHERINE KNIGHT 5 JULIE LANE 2 FIONA MATHEWS 7 PATRICIA PIMLOTT 6 ADRIAN SMITH 8 RORY WILSON 9 UTE WEYER10 et PENNY HAWKINS1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Service des animaux de laboratoire RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS Centre national de gestion cyn g tique APHA Sand Hutton York YO41 1LZ Centre national de gestion cyn g tique APHA Woodchester Park Gloucestershire GL10 3UJ D partement de la faune RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS Unit de r glementation sur les animaux utilis s des fins scientifiques Minist re de l int rieur Bo te postale A11 12 1er tage Peel 2 Marsham Street Londres SW1P 4DF Fera Science Ltd Sand Hutton York YO41 1LZ Hatherly Facult des sciences de la vie et de l environnement Universit d Exeter Prince of Wales Road Exeter EX4 4PS Norecopa chez l institut v t rinaire norv gien Bo te postale 750 Sentrum 0106 Oslo Norv ge Universit de Swansea Singleton Park Swansea SA2 8PP APHA Woodham Lane New Haw Addlestone Surrey KT15 3NB Correspondance barney reed rspca org uk Remarque les opinions exprim es dans ce rapport ne repr sentent pas n cessairement celles des auteurs ou de leurs organisations affili es Introduction Le pr sent rapport rend compte d une r union d une journ e convoqu e conjointement par la RSPCA et l Animal and Plant Health Agency APHA qui a rassembl environ 70 chercheurs v t rinaires technologues en sant animale entit s de r glementation et autres parties pr sentant un int r t pour le bien tre des animaux sauvages utilis s dans le cadre de proc dures r glement es la fois en captivit ou dans la nature Cette r union qui a eu lieu au Royaume Uni en septembre 2015 a abord un grand nombre de sujets tels que les r glementations relatives l utilisation des animaux sauvages des fins de recherche la r duction de l impact des proc dures employ es sur le terrain comme la capture et le pi geage l analyse et la r duction de l impact des appareils utilis s pour surveiller ou suivre les animaux l am lioration de l h bergement et des soins fournis en captivit et l valuation du bien tre La rencontre consistait en une s rie de pr sentations et de s ances de discussion La premi re partie de la r union s est concentr e sur l utilisation des animaux sauvages dans le cadre des proc dures employ es sur le terrain et la deuxi me partie tait ax e sur le bien tre des animaux sauvages captur s et plac s en captivit afin de servir pour diverses tudes Mots cl s Bien tre animaux sauvages capture am lioration du pi geage 32

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 33 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare INDICE DE LA REVISTA Investigaci n sobre la aclimataci n de ratas durante su transporte utilizando equipos de grabaci n nuevos situados en el lateral de la jaula el Gran Hermano de los Roedores DAVID SIMPSON Manchester Metropolitan University All Saints Building All Saints Manchester M15 6BH Correspondencia david simpson astrazeneca com Extracto de una tesis de m ster sobre el comportamiento animal Resumen Introducci n El transporte de animales desde el proveedor a las instalaciones de experimentaci n es uno de los factores que m s estr s causa en los animales de investigaci n El traslado inevitablemente causa estr s y cuando los animales llegan a las instalaciones de pruebas requieren un periodo de aclimataci n que no todos los laboratorios que trabajan con animales respetan Este estudio cuantifica el tiempo necesario tras el traslado para que el comportamiento de las ratas vuelva a unos niveles normales Los par metros investigados en este estudio han sido el peso corporal el comportamiento y la posici n de las jaulas El Gran Hermano de los Roedores es un novedoso sistema que se est desarrollando como un control autom tico del comportamiento animal en ratas con el fin de medir la actividad y la temperatura de los animales enjaulados en grupo Este estudio investiga el periodo de aclimataci n utilizando el sistema del Gran Hermano de los Roedores y forma parte de la validaci n del sistema M todos Las ratas Han Wistar llegaron a las instalaciones despu s de aproximadamente 6 horas de transporte por carretera A su llegada se las pes las y el grupo se dividi en tres por jaula Al utilizar el Gran Hermano de los Roedores el comportamiento y la ubicaci n de las ratas se fue registrando durante las 24 horas de los 7 d as de la semana asimismo el peso corporal fue registrado a diario Asimismo se llev a cabo una evaluaci n del peso corporal y se realizaron diversas grabaciones de v deo para investigar los cambios de comportamiento aptos para evaluar la aclimataci n al sitio nuevo Resultados Su peso corporal descendi durante el transporte aunque se volvi a recuperar r pidamente hasta alcanzar el peso corporal previo al traslado el tercer d a sin embargo nunca lleg al valor de la curva de crecimiento precedente a la entrega Despu s de la llegada la inactividad diurna descendi esto inclu a un aumento en la ingesta de alimentos toma de l quido y anidaci n Mientras que la toma de alimentos por la noche se redujo durante los dos primeros d as la actividad nocturna no se estabiliz hasta la quinta noche La ubicaci n dentro de las jaulas era bastante distante durante el primer d a El segundo d a las ratas empezaron a pasar m s tiempo en las esquinas de la jaula en detrimento del tiempo pasado en medio y cerca de las paredes de la jaula Se puede interpretar que las esquinas es el lugar m s seguro para descansar Debate Aunque ninguna de estas conclusiones es significativa como dato estad stico se pueden observar claramente cambios y variaciones a nivel gr fico durante el primer d a Estas ratas han experimentado una respuesta de jetlag cuando se han mostrado comportamientos nocturnos durante el d a y vice versa Estos cambios pueden deberse al largo periodo de oscuridad al que las ratas fueron sometidas durante el traslado La p rdida del peso corporal sugerir a que el transporte de animales tendr un efecto permanente para las ratas 33

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 34 Paper Summary Translations Aunque al cabo de dos d as estas conseguir n una nueva curva de crecimiento del peso corporal normal por debajo de la curva de crecimiento anterior a la entrega La inactividad animal sugiere que hay un periodo de jetlag nocturno hasta la quinta noche La posici n en las jaulas muestra que despu s de un d a inicial de exploraci n de la jaula la ubicaci n preferida de las ratas era en las esquinas Estos resultados demuestran que el transporte afecta a las ratas y que la normalizaci n de los comportamientos tras un transporte en tales condiciones podr a llevar hasta 6 d as Se requerir n estudios sobre distancias cortas y largas Asimismo una repetici n con ratas hembras podr a tambi n arrojar unas conclusiones diferentes La primera fase del estudio ha puesto de manifiesto varios problemas con el sistema del Gran Hermano de los Roedores siendo la iluminaci n y el software los principales causantes Con distinta iluminaci n y un software actualizado la segunda fase del estudio ha sido m s fruct fera con una p rdida del peso corporal bastante m s reducida El Gran Hermano de los Roedores est todav a siendo desarrollado y todav a no se pueden registrar an lisis autom ticos por tanto todas las observaciones de este estudio se registraron manualmente Palabras clave Transporte de animales aclimataci n comportamiento ratas gran hermano de los roedores 34

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 35 Paper Summary Translations Informe sobre una reuni n del RSPCA APHA sobre el bienestar de animales salvajes utilizados para fines de investigaci n BARNEY REED 1 SARAH BEATHAM 2 STEVE CARTER 3 ROS CLUBB 4 KATE GARROD 5 MATT GALE 6 MATT GOMM 2 KATHERINE KNIGHT 5 JULIE LANE 2 FIONA MATHEWS 7 PATRICIA PIMLOTT 6 ADRIAN SMITH 8 RORY WILSON 9 UTE WEYER10 y PENNY HAWKINS1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Research Animals Department RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS National Wildlife Management Centre APHA Sand Hutton York YO41 1LZ National Wildlife Management Centre APHA Woodchester Park Gloucestershire GL10 3UJ Wildlife Department RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS Animals in Science Regulation Unit Home Office Mailpoint A11 12 1st Floor Peel 2 Marsham Street Londres SW1P 4DF Fera Science Ltd Sand Hutton York YO41 1LZ Hatherly College of Life and Environmental Sciences University of Exeter Prince of Wales Road Exeter EX4 4PS Norecopa c o Norwegian Veterinary Institute PO Box 750 Sentrum 0106 Oslo Noruega Swansea University Singleton Park Swansea SA2 8PP APHA Woodham Lane New Haw Addlestone Surrey KT15 3NB Corrispondencia barney reed rspca org uk Abstract Este es un informe de una reuni n de un d a convocada conjuntamente por el RSPCA y la Animal and Plant Health Agency APHA que congreg aproximadamente a 70 investigadores veterinarios tecn logos de animales y reguladores entre otros interesados en el bienestar de los animales salvajes utilizados en procedimientos regulados tanto en un entorno natural como en cautividad En la reuni n que se celebr en el Reino Unido en septiembre de 2015 se trataron una serie de temas que inclu an las regulaciones sobre el uso de animales salvajes para fines de investigaci n la reducci n del impacto de los procedimientos de campo como la captura y trampas la revisi n y reducci n del impacto de dispositivos utilizados para controlar o rastrear animales la optimizaci n de jaulas y los cuidados en cautiverio adem s de la evaluaci n del bienestar La reuni n consisti en una serie de presentaciones y sesiones de debate La primera mitad de la reuni n se centr en el uso de animales salvajes en procedimientos llevados a cabo en libertad mientras que la segunda mitad se centr en el bienestar de los animales salvajes capturados y mantenidos en cautiverio para utilizar en distintos estudios Palabras clave Bienestar animales salvajes captura optimizaci n de trampas 35

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 36 Animal Technology and Welfare April 2017 INDICE DELLA REVISTA Valutazione dell effetto del trasporto sull acclimatazione dei ratti mediante l uso di un nuovo sistema di monitoraggio in gabbia Rodent Big Brother DAVID SIMPSON Manchester Metropolitan University All Saints Building All Saints Manchester M15 6BH Regno Unito Corrispondenza david simpson astrazeneca com Testo estratto da una tesi sul comportamento animale per un MSc Abstract Introduzione il trasporto dal fornitore al centro sperimentale uno dei maggiori fattori di stress nella vita degli animali usati a fini scientifici un inevitabile fonte di tensione seguita da un periodo di acclimatazione a cui vengono sottoposti gli animali al loro arrivo nella struttura sperimentale anche se tale procedura non sempre viene applicata nel settore della ricerca Questo studio si proposto di stabilire il tempo che intercorre dopo il trasporto prima che il comportamento del ratto ritorni alla normalit I parametri utilizzati sono stati peso corporeo comportamento e posizione nella gabbia Rodent Big Brother RBB un nuovo sistema atto al monitoraggio automatico del comportamento animale nei ratti con l obiettivo di misurare il livello di attivit e la temperatura di animali stabulati in gruppo Questo studio ha valutato il periodo di acclimatazione servendosi di tale sistema ed servito a convalidare il sistema stesso Metodologie i ratti Wistar Han sono arrivati presso la struttura dopo circa 6 ore di trasporto su strada Al loro arrivo sono stati pesati e quindi stabulati in gruppi di tre per gabbia Rodent Big Brother RBB ha permesso di raccogliere dati sul comportamento e l ubicazione dei ratti 24 ore su 24 per 7 giorni con misurazione giornaliera del loro peso corporeo La misurazione del peso e le registrazioni video sono servite a identificare eventuali variazioni nel comportamento utili per stabilire il livello di acclimatazione al nuovo ambiente Risultati il peso corporeo ha registrato un calo durante il trasporto ma stato rapidamente acquisito raggiungendo i livelli precedenti al loro arrivo entro il terzo giorno ma senza mai ritornare ai valori della curva di crescita preconsegna A seguito dell arrivo durante il giorno l inattivit diminuita con relativo aumento del consumo di cibo e liquidi e dell annidamento Nelle ore notturne tuttavia il consumo di cibo si ridotto nelle prime due giornate e l attivit notturna si stabilizzata solo alla quinta notte Durante il primo giorno i ratti si sono sparsi all interno della gabbia ma entro il secondo giorno hanno iniziato a trascorrere sempre pi tempo agli angoli riducendo la loro permanenza al centro o in prossimit delle pareti Gli angoli possono essere interpretati come il punto pi sicuro in cui poter riposare Discussione bench nessuno di questi risultati si sia rivelato statisticamente significativo la variazione e i cambiamenti del primo giorno sono chiaramente visibili nel grafico Questi ratti hanno mostrato una risposta disritmica esibendo comportamenti notturni durante le ore odierne e viceversa Questi cambiamenti potrebbero essere dovuti al lungo periodo di oscurit vissuto durante il trasporto La perdita di peso corporeo indica che il trasporto degli animali avr un effetto permanente su di essi ma sono riusciti a raggiungere una nuova curva di crescita con peso normale inferiore a quella pre consegna dopo soli due 36

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 37 Paper Summary Translations giorni L inattivit degli animali fa pensare a un periodo di jetlag durante le ore notturne fino alla quinta notte La posizione in gabbia mostra che dopo un giorno iniziale di esplorazione i ratti hanno scelto gli angoli come la loro ubicazione preferita Questi risultati denotano che il trasporto ha un certo effetto sui ratti e in base all effettiva distanza trascorsa potrebbero essere necessari 6 giorni prima della normalizzazione del comportamento Gli effetti causati da distanze pi brevi lunghe richiedono ulteriori studi e la ripetizione dell esperimento con ratte femmine potrebbe generare risultati diversi La prima fase dello studio ha portato alla luce diversi problemi con il sistema Rodent Big Brother principalmente legati all illuminazione e al software Avendo migliorato l illuminazione e aggiornato il software la seconda fase si rivelata considerevolmente migliore con una notevole riduzione nella perdita dei dati acquisiti RBB ancora in fase di sviluppo e quindi incapace di documentare l analisi automatizzata pertanto tutte le osservazioni di questo studio sono state effettuate manualmente Parole chiave trasporto degli animali acclimatazione comportamento ratti rodent big brother 37

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 38 Paper Summary Translations Resoconto di un incontro della RSPCA APHA sul benessere di animali selvatici usati a scopo di ricerca BARNEY REED 1 SARAH BEATHAM 2 STEVE CARTER 3 ROS CLUBB 4 KATE GARROD 5 MATT GALE 6 MATT GOMM 2 KATHERINE KNIGHT 5 JULIE LANE 2 FIONA MATHEWS 7 PATRICIA PIMLOTT 6 ADRIAN SMITH 8 RORY WILSON 9 UTE WEYER10 e PENNY HAWKINS1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Research Animals Department RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS Regno Unito National Wildlife Management Centre APHA Sand Hutton York YO41 1LZ Regno Unito National Wildlife Management Centre APHA Woodchester Park Gloucestershire GL10 3UJ Regno Unito Wildlife Department RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS Regno Unito Animals in Science Regulation Unit Home Office Mailpoint A11 12 1st Floor Peel 2 Marsham Street Londra SW1P 4DF Regno Unito Fera Science Ltd Sand Hutton York YO41 1LZ Regno Unito Hatherly College of Life and Environmental Sciences University of Exeter Prince of Wales Road Exeter EX4 4PS Regno Unito Norecopa presso Norwegian Veterinary Institute PO Box 750 Sentrum 0106 Oslo Norvegia Swansea University Singleton Park Swansea SA2 8PP Regno Unito APHA Woodham Lane New Haw Addlestone Surrey KT15 3NB Regno Unito Corrispondenza barney reed rspca org uk Nota le opinioni ivi espresse non rappresentano necessariamente quelle degli autori o delle organizzazioni a cui sono affiliati Introduzione Questo resoconto descrive la riunione organizzata congiuntamente dalla RSPCA e dalla Animal and Plant Health Agency APHA che ha riunito per un giorno circa 70 ricercatori veterinari stabularisti autorit di regolamentazione e altri soggetti interessati al benessere degli animali selvatici utilizzati in procedure regolamentate sia in natura che in cattivit L incontro tenutosi nel Regno Unito a settembre del 2015 ha esplorato vari aspetti tra cui le normative inerenti all uso degli animali selvatici a fini di ricerca la riduzione dell impatto delle procedure in campo quali la cattura e l intrappolamento la revisione e il calo dell impatto dei dispositivi utilizzati per il monitoraggio o il tracciamento degli animali il raffinamento della stabulazione e della cura in stato di cattivit e la valutazione del benessere Il meeting ha incluso una serie di presentazioni e discussioni La prima met della riunione ha posto l enfasi sull uso di animali selvatici in procedure condotte in campo mentre la seconda met ha affrontato il tema del benessere degli animali selvatici catturati e tenuti in cattivit per poi essere utilizzati negli studi scientifici Parole chiave benessere animali selvatici cattura intrappolamento raffinamento 38

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 39 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare TECH 2 TECH Haven t the time to write a paper but want to get something published Then read on This section offers readers the opportunity to submit informal contributions about any aspects of animal technology Comments observations descriptions of new or refined techniques new products or equipment old products or equipment adapted to new use any subject that may be useful to technicians in other institutions Submissions can be presented as technical notes and do not need to be structured and can be as short or as long as is necessary Accompanying illustrations and or photos should be high resolution NB Descriptions of new products or equipment submitted by manufacturers are welcome but should be a factual account of the product However the Editorial Board gives no warranty as to the accuracy or fitness for purpose of the product Thinking outside the Tox SANDY MACKAY Wickham Laboratories Limited Hoeford Point Barwell Lane Gosport Hampshire PO13 0AU Correspondence Reprinted with the permission of Medicine Maker Decisions around toxicology testing must be made using scientific methods not emotions or politics Toxicology is the science concerned with the nature effects and detection of poisons In the pharmaceutical industry the definition changes slightly to focus on assessing the safety of drug products a crucial element of drug development and product release whether for a new drug or a new indication for an old drug Traditionally toxicology has gone hand in hand with animal testing and it is true that a significant number of regulatory safety assessments use this approach However there is an increasing focus on the development of in vitro testing methods Although both in vivo and in vitro testing are intended to assess the safety of medicines they do diverge from one another in vivo tests tend to look at systemic effects whereas current in vitro methods generally only examine a specific biological process or function An example of the different approaches is the rabbit pyrogen test RPT versus the in vitro Monocyte Activation Test MAT The RPT is a long established test that gives a qualitative indication of the presence of pyrogens fever producing agents in the test substance being examined Over the last 20 years RPT has seen significant decline because of the implementation of the Limulus Amebocyte Lysate assay LAL which gives a quantitative indication of the presence of endotoxins Although the LAL assay has led to significant reduction in animal use there are limitations on the types of pyrogens that can be detected MAT has a wider range of detection abilities and is based on the human immune response It could completely replace RPT in many cases and is a good example of an in vitro success story Despite the successes of in vitro methods there are areas of concern So are these new methods putting an end to animal testing Not yet Despite the successes of in vitro methods there are areas of concern for example ensuring that the process for accepting methods is 39

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Tech 2 Tech consistent across regulatory agencies Particularly in respect to quality control assays different national pharmacopeias have different standards for adoption Some countries require that the in vitro method be at least as good as the animal method but other countries may accept a less robust method simply because it replaces animals In my view these decisions need to be made using scientific methods not emotions or politics It is a disservice to patients to introduce any method that might make medicines or medical devices less safe In vitro methods are also challenged by complexity par ticularly when it comes to regulator y toxicity studies such as those falling under good laboratory practice Potential interactions between whole body systems are extremely complex and not something that scientists can fully comprehend or simulate outside of the body right now There has certainly been very good progress in replacing animal testing with in vitro tests that scrutinize one particular behaviour response or interaction but replacing all animal tests is daunting to say the least The question of animal use is of course an important one and those involved in such testing should endeavour to continuously replace reduce refine and be responsible in animal use where possible That being said our first and foremost goal must continue to be patient safety and any new methodology should be assessed on that basis We should all welcome increased scientific collaboration and public engagement on replacing animal testing both are vital to a successful future for in vitro methods 40 Page 40

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 41 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare What it means for me to be a veterinary technician in biomedical research JAMES CHAMPION Morehouse School of Medicine Centre for Laboratory Animal Resources 720 Westview Drive SW Atlanta GA 30310 1495 USA Correspondence jchampion msm edu Reprinted from Speaking of Research https speakingofresearch com Introduction James Champion is a registered veterinary technician who is the Director of Operations of Morehouse School of Medicine s Centre for Laboratory Animal Resources He has worked in animal research for over twelve years He was also awarded the AAALAC International Fellowship Award in 2015 This award is presented by AAALAC International through a grant by Priority One Services Inc POS and in cooperation with the American Association for Laboratory Animal Science AALAS the Institute of Animal Technology IAT the Medical Research Council MRC and the National Institutes of Health NIH The AAALAC International Fellowship recognises two outstanding Registry participants each year one IAT Registered RAnTech technologist and one AALAS Registered RALAT RLAT RLATG or CMAR who have made or have the potential to make significant contributions to the field of laboratory animal care and use The award is intended to promote and reward the effor ts of individuals who have demonstrated a commitment to a career in laboratory animal science and have shown a strong interest in attaining additional education and training to become more proficient in their vocation The candidates nominated for this prestigious award must be either AALAS RALAT RLAT RLATG or CMAR Registered or IAT Registered RAnTech at Membership or Fellowship level into a fulfilling and exciting career As life often demonstrates to us our plans are meaningless I had been working as a veterinary technician since I was sixteen following that path until 2002 That is when a friend after seeing a job posting at Emory University asked me if I wanted to work with monkeys Of course my response was an immediate yes That was when my career in biomedical research began I was a veterinary technician for a research breeding facility where I helped to ensure all the animals were healthy and happy No one warned me of the backlash I would experience when I spoke of my new career I learned really quickly how hot of a topic biomedical research was It was also then that my undesired shame for what I did was starting to manifest I started to fear being targeted by animal rights groups having a debate every time I discussed my career as well as fear that I was blindly supporting the use of animals to better human life It soon became clear to me we don t talk about what we do A great example of this was during a Christmas holiday my cousin who happens to be diabetic and has scoliosis asked me How can you do that to those cute monkeys The ridiculousness of this question coming from someone who can directly What it means for me to be a veterinary technician in biomedical research Since I was a young child I have gravitated towards all animals For most of my life they seemed to be kindred spirits of mine This passion for animals led me to veterinary technology Although I admit I started as a veterinary technician so I could get experience that would eventually lead me to veterinary school it turned 41

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 42 Tech 2 Tech observe the benefits of animal research was not lost on me After the initial shock of being accused of doing something nefarious I truly understood her motivation for her question She had little to no understanding of how research works and how it is heavily regulated to which we owe much gratitude All current medical advances vaccines antibiotics treatments etc are all due to the animal heroes that have provided the data needed to combat diseases in both humans and animals Although my opinions of research are different than those that lack the understanding of the system my drive within my field is not different from others I have personally seen the positive results from research From the longevity of my pets to the treatment that allowed my grandmother to live reducing the debilitating effects of the stroke she had In addition to that I would not have been able to travel to England and Africa this past year without contracting any diseases without the vaccines and medications I was provided I wouldn t have been able to travel if I had not had back pain injections last year allowing me to stand upright and to sit for the length of time that was required for my international travel For me I feel like I am contributing the improved welfare of the world around me by participating in the industry that trains our future doctors as well as contributes to the medical advances in our understanding and treatments of diseases Unfortunately this was not quite enough for me to be at ease working in this field Despite the differences we humans have in our opinions it isn t our duty to change someone s views That is an internal and personal process and journey upon which we must embark alone Our duty as bastions of animal welfare is to proudly discuss our jobs as animal care givers Most people do not understand the process for applying planning and initiating any animal studies If more information is provided and more openness is observed less people may have as strong of negative impression of biomedical research as they do At this stage in my life it has become clear that I must be a part of the coming out of the research closet I began to speak at conferences for research staff as well as veterinary technician conferences speaking of the great work we do in research By inspiring our colleagues and openly talking about what I do I feel the path is set After much soul searching I found my purpose I could reconcile my doubts and put all of my energy in doing what I feel I was meant to do I became the advocate for our research animals This change was not a result of a promotion or specific instruction It was clear to me if I was not in my position putting the animal welfare as the utmost importance who would If you asked anyone in research you would find a high percentage of people that would gladly give up their careers if it meant not needing to use animals Unfortunately there is no suitable alternative at least not yet Until that day comes we in the research industry will continue to provide care for these animals Figure 1 That is when a friend asked me if I wanted to work with monkeys Of course my response was an immediate yes 42 Why do I think veterinary technicians are needed in research I may be biased since I am a veterinary technician that has become the Director of Operations of an animal research programme but I feel veterinary technicians are needed in research Most veterinary technicians have big hear ts making them compassionate care givers with an innate ability to recognise pain and suffering In addition to that critical quality veterinary technicians are able to triage cases to ensure inter vention is provided only when necessary Lastly most veterinary technicians have the ability to handle euthanasia although the worse part of the job understand the balance between costs versus care They do this daily taking care of others animals while their own are home waiting for them Being an animal lover I am often confronted with consternation that I can work in this field Although the inquiry can be offensive because it implies that I condone hurting animals in some way and that I do not care that we use animals for our needs If you know someone that is an animal lover as are most of us that work in this field ask yourself Is this job easy for someone that loves animals If they love animals this career must not be easy for them Instead of asking them how they can participate in this work try thanking them Thank them for being there 365 days a year to ensure these animals do not suffer and the best care possible is being provided Thank them also for combating emotional fatigue to ensure we are steadily studying disease and its treatments Lastly the animals that make this sacrifice should be thanked This gratitude can be shown by providing these animals with the best care possible Thus our scientists get the best data possible

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 44 Animal Technology and Welfare April 2017 Preparing to write a scientific abstract JAS BARLEY Institute of Animal Technology 5 South Parade Summertown Oxford OX2 7JL Correspondence atw iat org uk A scientific abstract summarises your research paper or article in a concise clearly written way that informs readers about the article s content Researchers use abstracts to determine whether a paper is relevant to their work and or decide which papers to acquire and read For academic conferences participants only receive copies of the abstracts in proceedings When readers search through electronic databases for articles the abstract is usually the sole part of the paper that they see without cost Typically 200 250 words a scientific abstract consists of five key parts title and author information background methods results and conclusions 1 Preparing to write an abstract 1 1 Complete your research paper Authors usually write their abstracts after they have finished their research papers so that the abstract contains the major points of the article If you need an abstract for a conference paper proposal before your paper is finished be sure to have a draft or outline form of the paper from which you can create your abstract 1 2 Read your research paper completely Highlight or underline the important points and copy and paste them into a separate document After you finish reading your paper review your underlined material and select sentences that help explain the research topic research question methods results and conclusion Retain this material for your abstract 1 3 Identify keywords Remember that online databases have keyword search engines for finding abstracts Note relevant keywords that will help researchers find your paper Set these aside for use in your abstract 2 Structuring an abstract 2 1 Explain the background of your study Provide an accurate summar y of the background research objectives including details of the species or strain of animal used key methods principal findings and conclusions of the study Using the material and keywords set aside from your paper as the basis write 1 3 introduction sentences that explain the research topic purpose of the study and research question s 44 The first sentence should be interesting eye catching and draw the reader into your piece As the shortest part of the abstract your background should convey what already is known about the subject and how it relates to your paper The background also explains what we do not know yet about the subject and thus what the study examined and or what your paper presents Think of the research paper as having investigated a particular scientific question Other researchers will value knowing your research question Your background section should answer questions like What did I study Why is my research question important What did my field of study know about my research question before I did this study How will this study advance knowledge in our field Try to use an active voice and reduce passive language throughout your abstract For example write I inter viewed Cassandra instead of Cassandra was interviewed by me Minimise use of pronouns like I or we Write about the study this paper examines or this research instead of my study or I write about Keep your abstract in the past or present tense but not in the future For instance do not write this paper will examine but this paper examines or the results showed 2 2 Share your research methods The second longest section of the abstract your methods section should explain in 2 3 sentences how you conducted your study and what exactly you did Did you use qualitative and or quantitative methods Methods can include laboratory experiments fieldwork interviews surveys and or data analysis Your methods section should answer the following questions G G G G G what was the research design how long did the study last what was the sample size how did you recruit participants what was the research setting 2 3 Demonstrate your results Write 1 2 sentences describing the results findings of your study Major findings include key quantitative or qualitative results or identified trends Your results section is the most

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 45 Tech 2 Tech important part of your abstract because it explains what you discovered and the relevance of your work to other people s research This is the time to elaborate and give details 2 4 Conclude with the main point and impact of your research In 1 2 sentences iterate your overall summary of the project and its theoretical and or practical impact on the pertinent field s of study State whether your research has filled a knowledge gap The conclusion should be data based and very factual Do not present unsubstantiated personal opinions End your conclusion with a strong final sentence 2 5 Choose a title for your abstract Your title should summarise the abstract and convince reviewers or potential readers that the topic is important relevant and innovative The abstract title can be the title of your paper Be sure to include your name institutional affiliation if applicable and contact information under the title conditions that offer comparisons For example 135 interlocutors participated or Subject A s performance was thirty percent better than Subject B s performance Written years should not have apostrophes Thus write 1990s rather than 1990 s Eliminate unnecessary content and add any missing important pieces of information 3 3 Complete a word count Make sure that your abstract is not too long or excessively short Aim to have as close to the word count limit as possible whether for example 200 or 250 words Some journals or conferences will reject abstracts that are too long so be sure to be accurate 3 4 Share your abstract with a friend or colleague Having another person review your abstract will ensure that your abstract makes sense to potential readers If they have suggestions for changes re read your abstract and revise your work Some organisations journals or conferences require a special format for the title which could be all uppercase letters bolded or italics 3 Checking style and flow 3 1 Read your abstract aloud and check content accuracy and flow Your abstract should be short and concise but also flow smoothly Make sure you have adequate transitions from sentence to sentence and consider adding transition words like additionally or fur thermore Fix any problem sentences that represent your findings inaccurately or are unclear in their meaning Read the abstract as if you were another researcher deciding whether to read your paper Do you find the abstract has the right information to help you decide whether to read it If not ask yourself what is missing 3 2 Proofread for correct grammar spelling and punctuation Consider printing out your abstract and editing it with a pencil or pen Having your work in print versus on your computer screen can help you catch additional mistakes and envision how your abstract will appear in printed mediums Because your writing style impacts readers perception of your work effective style and accurate grammar and mechanics are important elements of a successful abstract Do not end sentences with prepositions of for about Vary your verbs and nouns from sentence to sentence and use a print or online thesaurus for synonyms in order to not sound repetitive Avoid vague adjectives like very and many Try to quantify your findings with specific numbers or 45

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 47 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare ANDREW BLAKE TRIBUTE AWARD ENTRIES Time for change Practicalities of implementing non aversive methods for handling mice JOHN WATERS Mammalian Behaviour and Evolution Group Institute of Integrative Biology University of Liverpool Leahurst Campus Neston CH64 7TE Correspondence kimmy liv ac uk Andrew Blake Tribute Award 2017 winning entry Abstract Recent studies have shown that the method choice for handling laborator y mice is impor tant to animal welfare In 2015 60 of all animals used in Home Office procedures were laboratory mice Given the large number of mice within global facilities mouse welfare should be a high priority Improved handling not only leads to more consistent scientific data it can also lead to improved animal welfare Historically mice have been picked up by their tail a method that has been passed down to generations of technologists and is widely accepted as a method of handling Hurst and West 2010 showed that picking up mice by their tail induces aversion and high anxiety By contrast using alternatives such as a tunnel or cupped on the open hand leads to voluntary approach to the handler low anxiety and animals that more readily accept some physical restraint Hurst and West s findings were consistent across strains and sex of laboratory mice handlers with differing levels of experience and different light periods light dark From a welfare perspective the response from the mice on a daily basis is a positive step in the right direction The evidence presented by Hurst and West indicates that a change to the standard method for picking up mice would provide improved welfare for millions of mice worldwide However this will only happen if the non aversive methods are taken up by facilities To be successful the practicalities of these methods need to be demonstrated and appropriate instruction provided Sponsored by The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry for technical staff and researchers implementation of the methods to aid First I gained information from talking to technologists conducted a survey of their responses concerning key issues and established practical details of implementation in our own facility I then played a major part in designing and constructing a video based tutorial with accompanying commentar y to demonstrate the handling methods and their use in common laborator y situations from a practical technologist s viewpoint This includes ways to avoid common problems in implementation to reduce stress in both animals and the technologists carrying out the handling Although my main focus was practical implementation from an animal technologist s perspective as this will have the greatest impact on implementation the tutorial provides important training material for technologists and researchers alike With valuable support from NC3Rs to provide a webbased resource truly available to all nationally and internationally the tutorial is now hosted on the NC3Rs website http www nc3rs org uk mousehandling tutorial Statistics gained from NC3Rs for the first six weeks since its launch show that the tutorial is already being used in a wide range of countries in addition to the UK Feedback from fellow technologists in the United States has further enhanced the hope that animals outside of the UK will also benefit from the nonaversive methods of handling that have been developed 47

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 48 Andrew Blake Tribute Award Entries Introduction In 2010 Hurst and West published a paper entitled Taming Anxiety in Laboratory Mice Nature Methods 7 825 826 This outlined the significant improvements to the welfare of laboratory mice that can be seen by avoiding the traditional tail handling method and using a non aversive alternative Picking up mice by the base of the tail has historically been accepted as the method of choice for handling them but there has been an absence of any scientific data to substantiate this method of handling This has been passed down through generations of technologists without any thought as to the impact it has upon laboratory mice Hurst and West 2010 presented significant data to show that mice find tail handling aversive resulting in high levels of anxiety in those picked up by the tail Two alternative methods of handling were presented that do not induce this aversion and anxiety leading to more reliable scientific data and a significant improvement in mouse welfare They compared the response of laboratory mice picked up and held by three different methods by the tail base cupped on the open hand or picked up inside a transparent tunnel In each handling session the handler picked up each mouse in turn by the designated method and held it for 30 s After moving away from the open cage for 60 s the mice were handled again so that each mouse was picked up twice and held for a total of 60 s The voluntary response to the handler was recorded for each of the handling methods This showed that mice habituated to tunnel or cup handling are much more willing to interact voluntarily with their handler regardless of strain handler s experience and if carried out in the dark or light period Hurst was awarded the 2010 NC3Rs prize for the most outstanding original contribution to scientific and technological advances in 3Rs NC3Rs recognised that the work has the potential to improve the lives of millions of laboratory mice Funded by a NC3Rs studentship Gouveia 2014 carried out fur ther research to establish the practicalities of how long and how frequently mice need to be handled to gain the benefits of these alternative handling methods She showed that only brief handling 2s was sufficient to improve the response towards the handler and anxiety compared to those picked up by the tail Frequent handling using non aversive methods increased tameness but this was not the case for tail handled mice The potential impact that this work could have is substantial Handling stress confounds research studies involving physiological or behavioural responses Increased data variability due to uncontrolled handling stress can result in impaired test 48 performance due to stress false positive or negative responses and requires more animals for testing High anxiety induced by previous handling experience can cause particularly strong impairment of performance in behavioural studies Gouveia 2014 Gouveia and Hurst submitted Handling also has a substantial impact on the animal s welfare In 2015 mice made up 60 of all animals used throughout the UK in Home Office regulated procedures This equated to over 1 million mice without taking into account the many animals that are held within facilities that undergo procedures that are not regulated The number of mice within UK facilities that could benefit from improved handling could be in the many millions and considerably greater than this worldwide However the use of alternative methods to handle mice in the laboratory will only be of benefit if carried out correctly Incorrect implementation could result in high levels of stress reducing the impact or even having the reverse effect of increased stress and anxiety Following the publication of Hurst and West 2010 there was uncer tainty about how the alternative handling methods would impact upon the daily running of animal units if there was widespread adoption It became clear that a few issues needed to be addressed in order to facilitate a smooth transition to the new methods of handling and allow laboratory mice and the technical research community to benefit from the new findings The largest impact would be on animal technologists responsible for the day to day care of animals and who would be responsible for the changeover of methods For this any negative impacts would have to be as small as possible The technologists needed guidance from somebody who had implemented the methods recognised common mistakes made and could offer guidance on how to overcome any problems My own contribution has thus focused on understanding the range of concerns and potential issues across a broad range of animal technologists and facilities and the provision of simple clear and practical advice To understand the range of concerns and potential issues I organised a workshop on mouse handling at the Institute of Animal Technology Annual Congress 2012 In addition to implementing the new methods in my own local animal facility where I am NACWO I conducted two small studies to gain some objective data on potential issues of concern I then helped to put together a tutorial on mouse handling both by providing the technologist s perspective on practical handling issues and by filming appropriate video clips with associated commentary to demonstrate best practice in different scenarios and how to avoid common problems that we had identified Initially I presented the tutorial in person at an event organised by Charles River and on invitation to the BSG Technician Symposium in Cambridge This provided useful

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 49 Andrew Blake Tribute Award Entries feedback to improve the tutorial which has now been turned into a freely available on line resource hosted on the NC3Rs website Details of these activities are outlined in separate sections below Consultation with professional Animal Technologists The opinions of animal technologists concerning the findings by Hurst and West 2010 and their practical implementation in animal facilities was gained via a workshop at the Institute of Animal Technology 2012 Congress which was attended by 60 delegates all experienced animal technologists Following on from a presentation by Professor Hurst I gave a presentation on practical issues and led an interactive question and answer session to discuss the issues from my own perspective after implementing the new methods in my local animal facility The main purpose was to show best practice and give some advice to help others wishing to carry out the methods based on our own experience The workshop would also help me gain information about the issues that others perceived or had experienced Each participant was provided with a handset to submit answers to a set of 15 questions which were collated with TurningPoint polling software This allowed me to share responses instantaneously with the delegates to guide the discussion and also allowed me to store the data for future analysis The questions asked and resulting responses are summarised in Table 1 Q1 Following on Hurst and West s findings does your facility currently implement new handling methods Yes No 17 83 Q2 What is the main reason for technologists not implementing new methods Time Cost Scientific protocol Manager instructed 73 0 0 9 Other 18 Q3 What is the most common method of handling laboratory mice in your facility Tail Hand Tunnel Other 95 5 0 0 Q4 Roughly what of animals in your facility consist of laboratory mice 0 25 26 50 51 75 76 100 6 19 22 53 Q5 When transferring mice to a clean cage by the tail do you support the mouse on your arm or hand Yes always Yes sometimes No never 30 54 16 Q6 What would be the mouse s preferred colour choice for a home tunnel Red Clear 67 23 Q7 Does your facility supply environmental enrichment for laboratory mice Yes No 97 3 Q8 What is the main reason technologist s supply enrichment Improves welfare Direct instruction Scientific protocol 100 0 0 Other 0 Q9 How much longer would you be prepared to add onto cleaning to improve welfare None 1 2 seconds 3 4 seconds 5 seconds or more 3 33 17 47 Q10 By which of these methods are you more likely to be bitten Tail hand support Tunnel Cup 73 3 24 Table continued 49

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 50 Andrew Blake Tribute Award Entries Q11 Which of these lab species are you more likely to form a bond with Rabbit Cat Mouse Primate 3 22 0 11 Dog 64 Q12 Which of these lab species are you less likely to form a bond with Rabbit Cat Mouse Primate 8 4 84 4 Dog 0 Q13 After the evidence presented today are you more likely to implement a new handling method Yes No Undecided 73 9 18 Q14 If you were to change from tail handling which method would you choose Tunnel Cup Other 54 43 3 Q15 Is it the role of an animal technician to develop better welfare practices Yes No Don t know 94 6 0 Table 1 Responses to Institute of Animal Technology Congress 2012 workshop on mouse handling This revealed that only 17 of facilities were yet implementing the new handling methods for mice although the work had been well publicised Among the 60 delegates 95 reported tail to be the most common method for handling laboratory mice in their facility The main reason for not implementing the new methods was the perceived time required thought to take longer than tail handling by most respondents However it was interesting that 97 of workshop participants were willing to add at least 1 2 seconds per mouse to their cleaning schedule to benefit animal welfare and nearly half 47 would spend 5 seconds extra per mouse Two thirds of respondents also felt that mice would prefer red over clear handling tunnels It was encouraging to see that 73 indicated that they would be more likely to implement a new handling method following the workshop though 19 were still undecided However there were concerns regarding the implementation and it was clear that tail handling was still the most common method in most facilities more than 15 months on from the Hurst and West 2010 publication The challenge remained how to convince technologists and their managers to implement improved methods of handling within their establishments Practical issues To address some practical issues which were raised by technologists at the workshop and might inhibit implementation of the new methods of handling I conducted two brief studies to gain some objective data outlined below Time issue concerns with alternative methods of handling While Hurst and West 2010 used a substantial 50 duration of handling 60 s per day to demonstrate the major difference in mouse response to alternative handling methods Gouveia 2014 showed that only brief 2 s handling was sufficient to make a difference Further my own experience of in house implementation suggested that simply handling mice to transfer them between cages at cleaning was sufficient to tame mice to the two non aversive handling methods Even so others voiced concern that using alternative methods to transfer mice during cage cleaning would add extra time to cleaning schedules Cleaning is a major part of a technologist s daily routine A method that adds extra time to an already tight time budget is not going to be attractive to technologists bringing the benefits into conflict with potential costs It is of major importance to find a balance between the two in order to eliminate stress from both the animal and technologist during this husbandry procedure To understand whether there is likely to be an increased cost of handling time during cage cleaning I set up a small study to compare the time required to clean mice out using three methods of handling customary tail handling encouraged into a tunnel or cupped on the hand to transfer animals between cages I set up a camera to observe one of two technologists cleaning out laboratory mice The 49 mice used were a mixture of C57BL 6 BALB c and ICR CD 1 males and females obtained from Envigo UK The mice were housed in conventional MB1 cages Nor th Kent Plastics in groups of 2 5 containing corn cob substrate and paper nesting material IPS Ltd Each cage was enriched with a cardboard mouse house

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 51 Andrew Blake Tribute Award Entries The two technologists were aware of the filming but were not told the reason why until afterwards to avoid biasing the results The technologists were of varying levels of experience but completely competent in all three methods It should be noted that the time recorded was cage transfer time only and the time to remove any enrichment was not recorded Each technologist handled the mice by each method involving three separate cage cleans by each technologist Wilcoxon matched pair tests compared the duration of handling between each pair of methods taking handler into account There was no significant difference in the amount of time taken to clean mice by either tunnel or cup when compared to the traditional tail method Figure 1 The cup method had a slight increase in time compared to tunnel handling due to some mice jumping off the hand and back into cage However although this differed from tunnel handling it was not significantly longer than for mice picked up and transferred by the tail Figure 1 I did not find that tunnel or cup handling added time to our cleaning procedures compared to tail handling when carried out by personnel that were well practiced and competent in all three handling techniques Carrying out a formal evaluation of the time it took to pick up and transfer mice between cages during cleaning allowed me to answer the question of time with confidence when technologists showed concern about how it would impinge on their daily routine and to ease any apprehension that changing handling methods would add more time onto their daily workload A completely independent test of the impact of tail versus tunnel handling on the duration of cage cleaning was carried out by Lynn McLaughlin in the main Biomedical Cage transfer time s Handling method Figure 1 Cage transfer time seconds for mice handled by three methods n 98 transfers per method mean sem Services Unit at the University of Liverpool talk presented at the LASA conference 2015 This confirmed that technologists could clean out as quickly using a tunnel once very familiar and competent with the method However she showed that it took technologists time to get good at using the new method Inevitably some time is needed to gain good handling skills using any method The important issue is to ensure that personnel know how to implement the new methods in a safe and efficient way Clearly a resource was needed to help train technologists so that they could learn best practice as quickly as possible Tunnel preference The initial work carried out at our animal facility leading to the publication of Hurst and West 2010 and Gouveia and Hurst 2013 was carried out using transparent tunnels However there is general support for the use of red as the optimum colour choice for laborator y animal enrichment because mice are relatively insensitive to red light and therefore perceive red shelters as darker An issue raised was that mice might not want to utilise transparent tunnels within the cage as much as red tunnels although clear tunnels allow better observation of animals As clear tunnels that are placed within cages for tunnel handling can also double up as enrichment would mice prefer a red tunnel over a clear one I carried out a small observational study to determine whether there was any major preference among 4 singly housed male BALB c laboratory mice The mice were housed in M3 cages North Kent Plastics but moved to a MB1 cage North Kent Plastics for the duration of the filming The standard stainless steel mesh cage top was replaced by a clear Perspex top with ventilation holes Food and water were presented within cage with the water bottle in a metal holder and food in a dish The test cage contained corn cob substrate IPS Ltd paper nesting material IPS Ltd and a cardboard mouse house Datesand Ltd The Mean no of visits Datesand Ltd and a clear plastic tunnel Clear Plastic Supplies 50mm diameter 130mm long 3mm thick Figure 2 Number of visits by singly housed male BALB c mice to red and clear tunnels within a cage n 4 mean sem 51

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 52 Andrew Blake Tribute Award Entries mice were supplied with a choice of two similar plastic tunnels 50mm diameter 130mm long 3mm thick one red in colour and one clear The mice were filmed over a four hour period during the active dark phase of the light cycle under red light to determine if the mice had a colour preference The mice had an opportunity to habituate to the two tunnels prior to the test being carried out feedback previously gained Kelly Gouveia was responsible for putting together a section on scientific background to introduce the tutorial and explain why non aversive handling is important We drafted the accompanying commentary to provide clear instruction and advice which was then approved in joint meetings with Professor Hurst The layout of the tutorial covers three main areas There was no clear preference for one tunnel over the other During filming the mice visited both tunnels but did not use either tunnel as a place to nest or spend long periods of time This confirmed our general observations when providing transparent or opaque tunnels as enrichment in cages within our facility The mice enjoyed climbing over and going through the tunnels indicating that a tunnel within the cage has enrichment value regardless of the colour and transparency consistent with previous observations While there is no major preference for one tunnel type over the other there are advantages to using a clear tunnel over a red tunnel When handling mice using a clear tunnel health checks can be conducted on normal healthy animals without having to remove the animal or manipulate the mouse to examine its ventral surface Mice exhibit normal behaviours within the tunnel and remain calm allowing any abnormalities in movement or behaviour to be noticed through the transparent sur face Visual inspections are more difficult using red tunnels and any minor injuries could be missed It is apparent that in our facility the mice do not use the tunnels as a nesting place but more as an enrichment The ability to conduct brief health checks within clear tunnels potentially can save a little time on daily duties and help to ensure the good health of the animals providing a clear advantage for using clear over coloured tunnels Mouse handling tutorial My supervisor Professor Hurst gained funding through a BBSRC Sparking Impact Award to produce a tutorial that would train technologists and researchers in the new handling methods and explain the potential impact from both a mouse welfare and scientific perspective This funding allowed me to spend the equivalent of one day per week over a 9 month period working on the tutorial from the initial design to finished product and presentation to suitable audiences I was specifically tasked with bringing a technologist s perspective to illustrate the practical issues of implementing the new handling methods in a busy animal facility I also had to establish suitable filming conditions to provide high quality video clips and then film suitable clips to illustrate the methods and their implementation conducted with the help of Professor Hurst s PhD student Kelly Gouveia The story board for the tutorial was decided jointly between the three of us based on 52 1 Impact of human animal interactions and handling stress in mice This introduces the value of the mouse to the scientific community as a universal model but points out that the relationship between the mouse and human handler is not well understood 2 Introduction to non aversive methods for handling mice and effects on welfare and experimental results This covers reduction in stress to the mouse and how this can improve scientific data 3 Practicalities of non aversive handling best practice for implementation in routine husbandr y and experimental procedures This looks at how the methods can be implemented from a technical point of view with minimum disruption to normal work It also addresses common difficulties experienced and how to avoid these This section comprises the main body of the tutorial and is the most crucial for training purposes Ensuring the correct implementation of the alternative handling methods is by far the most important aspect of the tutorial with the potential to make the largest contribution to mouse welfare However even highly experienced animal technologists and researchers may not have had appropriate training to correctly implement the new handling methods Although these look simple I know from experience that if not carried out well they can take extra time and cause stress to both the handler and the mice We thus identified the main key issues and targeted video clips to provide clear visual demonstrations Making instructional video clips To ensure high production quality I filmed the video clips using a Panasonic HDC SD9 HD camcorder mounted on a tripod Extra lighting was provided using 2 Polaroid 256 LED Video Light panels After initial trials we decided that a clear MB1 cage base without cage enrichment would provide the clearest video clips for demonstration purposes and used a curtain to provide a plain non distracting background Videos clips were trimmed of superfluous material to ensure that viewers would focus only on the point being made and converted into MP4 format Still photographs were shot with an Olympus E410 DSLR camera and edited using Olympus Master editing software

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 53 Page 53 Andrew Blake Tribute Award Entries Tunnel and cup handling as an alternative to picking up by the tail The first video clips in the tutorial provide a simple video demonstration of tail tunnel and cup methods for picking up mice to familiarise the viewer with what these methods involve We also emphasise that animals that are picked up by tunnel or cup can still be restrained by the tail as this does not increase stress This ensures that people understand that it is picking up mice by the tail that is stressful Practicalities of tunnel handling This section deals with how to hold a handling tunnel correctly how to get mice into the tunnel and return them to the cage We show how to position the tunnel correctly to avoid mice bypassing the tunnel and use of the free hand to guide the mouse into the tunnel We emphasise the need to take charge of the situation and not let the mouse decide when to go inside the tunnel as indecisiveness in this situation results in frustration for the technologist and increases handling time The video demonstrates that gently tipping the mouse out backwards is the best way to remove the mouse while shaking the tunnel must be avoided We also point out the advantage of a plastic tunnel that the animals cannot grip but discuss the range of different tunnels that can be used Practicalities of cup handing This section deals with how to handle mice by the cupping method and return them back to their home cage We show how to offer open hands to the mouse use the corner of the cage and that the mouse will happily sit on the open hands To return the mouse the hands are lowered into the cage and the mouse will leave safely back to its cage We show two methods that can be used to habituate mice to sit on open hands happily without attempting to jump off We show that the mouse can first be held between closed hands for approximately 10 s before the hands are opened We use a video clip to demonstrate that mice typically are then willing to sit calmly on the hand though warn that this may take a few sessions with very jumpy animals Once habituated there is no longer any need to enclose mice within the hands We also show that mice already habituated to being picked up in a tunnel will sit calmly if then tipped out backwards onto the open hand combining the two methods Cage transfer As cage cleaning is one of the main reasons to handle mice we first show that using the alternative methods takes no longer than tail handling once practiced Later in the tutorial we show video demonstrations of how this can be easily achieved with each method without chasing mice around their home cage Handling for common procedures We include video clips to demonstrate how to transfer animals picked up by tunnel or by cupping to scruff restraint where procedures require this level of restraint and that this can be achieved just as quickly and practically when mice are picked up by the tail We also present data showing that scruff restraint is not stressful for animals that have been accustomed to tunnel or cup handling Lastly we show how easily animals can be transferred to other locations such as an anaesthetic chamber using either the tunnel or cup method Testing out the tutorial I presented the tutorial to technologists and researchers at two events using a PowerPoint format One event was the Charles River sponsored technologist event held in Liverpool the other was an IAT Cambridge Branch Symposium entitled Leave our Tails Alone The tutorial was presented to see if the content and level of the information worked well and was well understood by fellow technologists The feedback at the end of the presentations was well received and the video content was felt to be important in helping with the uptake Online resource Ideally we wanted the tutorial to be freely available to anyone to watch at any time either as part of a formal training course or for self tuition Following discussions with NC3Rs Mark Prescott offered to work with us and with a video company to produce a professional online resource that they would host to help maximise the uptake An online resource would allow the viewer to fast for ward or rewind as required for fur ther clarification To ensure that the audio commentary was as clear as possible Katie Lidster from NC3Rs agreed to read the commentar y as she had previous experience on other NC3Rs videos We then worked with the video company to ensure that the timing of commentary and video fully corresponded to get over the points we wanted to make reviewed each draft and suggested suitable amendments until we were happy with the final version The tutorial was launched live on the NC3Rs website on 26th September 2016 to correspond with the NC3Rs Annual Technician Symposium This can be viewed at http www nc3rs org uk mouse handling tutorial I was invited to attend the symposium to discuss the tutorial and any questions or issues with fellow delegates Feedback once again was very positive with some technologists stating that they are slowly implementing the new techniques in their facilities They particularly appreciated the opinion of another technologist who understood what is expected of animal technologists and how the implementation of 53

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 54 Andrew Blake Tribute Award Entries new ideas can impact on their daily routines All were in agreement that there are positive benefits to laboratory mouse welfare but there is still some uncertainty about the amount of time the new methods will take to carry out Analysis of mouse handling tutorial usage NC3Rs has been tracking the number of views of the tutorial since its launch and where in the world it is being accessed from Figures 3 and 4 This indicates that the tutorial is being viewed in countries around the world and not solely reaching UK establishments Although the statistics cover only a six week period since the launch so far it is very encouraging indeed that the site has been accessed 2160 times and the tutorial played 1545 times over this time period Figure 3 Summary of mouse handling tutorial views total number and geographical spread on the NC3Rs website for the first six weeks after launch 26th September 2016 to 11th November 2016 Discussion The tutorial provides a resource that is suitable for animal technologists and for research staff and students and is available to all relevant establishments within the UK and worldwide By highlighting common problems that can be encountered initially it should be of particular help in aiding technologists with the transition from tail handling to non aversive methods Ultimately this will lead to improved welfare for millions mice held in establishments across the world As time constraints have been pointed out as the most important factor in limiting uptake of the new methods from a technologist s point of view it was vitally important that this was addressed in the tutorial to show how to capture animals efficiently Otherwise this important refinement could simply be discarded as being impractical in a busy establishment From my own practical experience of implementation I know that this is not the case but a proper training tutorial is essential to show other technologists how to implement the new methods and avoid time consuming mistakes With support from NC3Rs the tutorial is now available via their website The initial uptake is encouraging though we are looking at further steps to advertise the tutorial and encourage uptake particularly outside the UK I am also currently preparing a FAQ for the NC3Rs website to accompany the tutorial A technologist has a moral obligation to uphold the highest standard of welfare for animals within their care I have discovered for myself the considerable benefits of avoiding picking up mice by the tail and using alternative methods from the obvious difference this makes in their behaviour By playing a major role in putting together this tutorial and focusing on essential practical issues I hope it will provide other technologists and researchers with the necessary information and encouragement to carry out the changes needed so that all mice will benefit Testimonials The value of promoting non aversive methods via the tutorial and other presentations can be measured through uptake by the research community Although slow to start with the methods are now starting to be trialled and taken up I will continue to offer advice and support and will try to help with any issues raised As a unit that now solely uses this method for routine handling we have been able to see the benefits to the mice without any negative effects on the day to day running of our animal unit Figure 4 Countries that have accessed the mouse handling tutorial on the NC3Rs website over the first six weeks after launch 26th September 2016 to 11th November 2016 54 The following are testimonials from technical staff who have adopted the non aversive methods in their facilities They too are seeing the benefits without too much disruption to their daily routines This is a small change to husbandry procedures but has a large impact upon mouse welfare

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 55 Andrew Blake Tribute Award Entries Thanks especially for sharing the video I have in turn shared it with my supervisor and she is considering making the tunnel technique our standard practice for our facility with Jess s endorsement Once our facility is on board I m confident other LARC facilities in the IU School of Medicine will learn about it as well The video is compelling enough I don t see how anyone could argue against a simple change that demonstrably makes for such happier animals It s ideas like this that so clearly improve animal well being that make this work interesting and worthwhile every day Yes I really like using tunnels to transfer mice from cage to cage The video really sold me on it seeing the difference a simple change in handling has on each mouse s well being and how that affected their behavior on tasks like the star maze and their decreased fear response to a human hand made me much more conscious of my handling technique With naive mice I find that it does take a little longer to transfer from cage to cage but with mice acclimatised to the tunnels it is as quick and easy as any other method I ve tried More than anything though my own initial ineptness with the tunnels slowed me down but once I was comfortable with it time is not an obstacle I was very impressed with the video and happy to learn that there was something I could so easily change that makes a difference to these animals It is just great to see that I can have an effect on the well being of the mice Thanks again Nikki Cobb LARC Indiana University School of Medicine Department of Pathology at Cambridge has switched to tunnel cup handling for all technologists Some research staff have adopted this others still utilise tail handling We find newer research staff members very keen to engage with the new handling techniques although some old timers are a bit resistant We now find tunnel handling as quick as tail capture although initially there is a time investment We moved a room at a time to the technique to manage the workload The cost of tunnel purchase has been slightly offset by reduced need for disposable cardboard tunnels now that each cage has a polycarbonate tunnel at all times We ve seen a huge improvement in interaction between mice and handler and definitely wouldn t want to go back to tail capture Regards Lisa Wright NACWO Facility Manager Department of Pathology University of Cambridge Tennis Court Road Cambridge CB2 1QP 55

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 56 Andrew Blake Tribute Award Entries After a small trial period with handling tubes cupped hands I as NACWO implemented a tail lift ban for all husbandry interactions with our mice eventually staff have found no major issues with time once we and the mice got the hang of no tail lifting I did invest in handling tubes but this investment was considered worthwhile as having the tubes in the majority of the cages helped remind staff of the tail lift ban and promoted the change in our behaviour not to use the tails The NC3Rs video has also helped show the benefits to staff with reservations or long standing tail lift skills My AWERB HOI and NVS are full supporters of us adopting Hurst and West s paper on alternative methods of handling researchers were informed of the proposed shift away from tail lifting and have agreed to this as a worthwhile refinement Andy Milner Technical Manager Bioresources Unit University of Portsmouth Acknowledgements I would like to acknowledge the following who have helped make this resource material readily available BBSRC Sparking Impact Award to JL Hurst which funded creation of the tutorial Professor J Hurst Mammalian Behaviour Group University of Liverpool for the original research gaining funding and help with the tutorial and providing comments on this application Dr Kelly Gouveia for the scientific validation included in the tutorial Also for her support and dedication in helping produce the video material used within the tutorial NC3Rs for funding and helping us to turn the tutorial into a web based resource hosting this on their website http www nc3rs org uk mouse handlingtutorial and promoting uptake Katie Lidster NC3Rs for narrating our audio script Animal technologists throughout the UK for their time in attending talks for their valuable efforts in trying to get the methods established within their own facilities and for having the passion and belief that the new methods are positively improving mouse welfare 56 References 1 2 3 4 5 Hurst J L and West R S 2010 Taming anxiety in laboratory mice Nature Methods 7 825 826 Gouveia K and Hurst J L 2013 Reducing mouse anxiety during handling Effect of experience with handling tunnels PLoS ONE 8 e66401 Gouveia K 2014 Taming anxiety and variation in laboratory mice PhD thesis University of Liverpool McLaughlin L 2015 Alternative handling technique for mice Pros and Cons Presentation at LASA London UK Gouveia K and Hurst J L submitted Optimising reliability of mouse performance in behavioural testing the major role of non aversive handling

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 57 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare AS ET CONGRESS 2017 BURSARY COMPETITION ESSAYS The Animals in Science Education Trust AS ET is a charity registered under UK Charity law with the objective of advancing education and promoting excellence in the care and welfare of animals used in science The essays included in this issue were amongst those submitted for the second AS ET Bursary competition to attend IAT Congress 2017 The intention of the bursary is to encourage junior animal technical staff to extend their knowledge and experience by attending the largest animal technology meeting in the UK More information including details of how you can support AS ET can be found at http www animalsinscience educationtrust org uk Applications were invited from animal technical staff based in the UK or the Republic of Ireland who were awarded the IAT Level 2 Diploma in Laboratory Animal Science and Technology in 2014 2015 or 2016 The successful applicant is selected on the basis of a 1000 word essay on a prescribed subject The 2016 subject was Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made MICAH DUPONT University of Birmingham Biomedical Services Unit Vincent Drive Edgbaston Birmingham B15 2TT Correspondence micahraidupont gmail com Winner of the AS ET Bursary Competition to attend Congress 2017 The five C s Commitment To the animals that are in your care 24 hours a day 365 days a year and ensuring they have the highest quality of care throughout their lifetime The key commitment of animal technicians is guaranteeing that all animals within the facility have their appropriate welfare and health needs met whether it is something as simple as ensuring that animals have the appropriate food for their life or physiological state or more complex needs such as ensuring that an animal is given the correct and most appropriate analgesia and anaesthetics when used for surgical procedures Confirming each and every animal is checked a 57

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 58 AS ET Congress 2017 Bursary Competition Essays minimum of once a day if problems arise with their physical health ensuring animals get either appropriate treatment to alleviate pain or to humanely euthanise an animal if their suffering is intense A commitment to measures such as replacement reduction and refinement to guarantee that the 3Rs are constantly being re evaluated and updated to use the least number of animals or to enhance their lives Continually evaluating each animal s severity levels for physical mental and social wellbeing and if exceeded perform appropriate actions Communication Is a vital part of the role as there are various parties such as other technicians researches the Named Animal Care and Welfare Officer management and the Named Veterinary Surgeon who rely on information from animal technicians Communication in the workplace allows sites to be run productively and ensures that everyone who needs information to make informed decisions which can be key for the research being undertaken or the general health and welfare of animals As animal technicians are the people that come into contact with the majority of the animals on a daily basis they learn a lot about their stock They can advise on subjects such as how to increase breeding efficacy if they come across any adverse effects in strains monitor severity limits health welfare and behavioural issues they have come across and much more Communication can aid job satisfaction and allows animal technicians to suggest ideas they may help the workplace to run more efficiently It can allow people to gain more competence and ask for more training and supervision on tasks they find difficult therefore promoting good teamwork Continued Professional Development CPD This is important for animal technicians as this allows staff to become more of a asset to the company builds confidence and competence aids with career goals and allows progression to more significant roles It enhances job satisfaction and allows animal technicians to understand impor tant rules and regulations that directly affect their job roles Continued Professional Development also benefits the company as it allows staff members to learn more technically difficult procedures it encourages staff development which leads to an enthusiastic and content workforce allows staff to know what they need to focus on for their long term career goals and it enhances staff performance and knowledge by keeping them up to date on new policies and procedures Competence Ensuring that animal technicians are suitably trained to perform tasks People learn at their own pace and not everyone will learn skills in the same time frame Competence is extremely important in an animal unit to protect animals and humans as there are some procedure that could be severely harmful It is important to ensure animal technicians are competent 58 and if they are not comfortable performing a procedure or staff do not feel they have had enough training it is important they receive support supervision during procedures or not allow them to perform a task if they are not comfortable Competence is a mixture of a person s skill set and their personal feelings towards performing a task proficiently in the workplace It is hard to measure when someone is first learning a skill animal technicians must be honest with their employer on whether they feel they are competent Compassion To care about any pain suffering lasting harm or distress that may occur to each and every animal within your care and help them have an enhanced quality of life As animal technicians we should be compassionate and respectful to all animals We should treat animals as individuals and should react accordingly to their individual situations Different species of animals have species specific needs they will prioritise certain tasks over others and as animal technicians we should try an allow animals to fulfil their species specific needs by firstly understanding the animals we care for and secondly provide materials that allow them to per form these naturalistic behaviours for example nest building in mice is an activity that keeps them mentally stimulated aids reproduction allows them to thermoregulate and can be a safe area for less dominate mice to escape more dominate cage mates Animals technicians should be considerate about all aspects such as their physical state mental and social wellbeing

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 59 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made CALLUM BRANSTONE University of Leicester Department of Biomedical Science PO Box 138 Leicester LE1 9HN Correspondence clb72 leicester ac uk Training Training is likely the most important aspect of a trainee animal technician s job without it they cannot do their job or hope to progress their career It has two roles in animal technology the first is teaching new skills These skills can be the simplest of tasks like removing cages from a rack or even turning on a changing station but they advance to more complex duties such as performing health checks or mating animals A lot of these skills might have been taught elsewhere but licenced procedures will almost definitely be a new experience for trainee animal technicians with a personal licence so training is key The other role of training in animal technology is advancing pre existing skills They can be developed in any number of ways for example an animal technician may be taught how to pick up a mouse in a less stressful manner or clean out cages by a quicker method Skills can always be built upon and from a variety of influences not just within this industry It is down to everyone to train not just the Named Training and Competency Officer but includes colleagues who can improve each other s skills or give advice Individual technologists should seek training available Ultimately training makes animal technicians faster smarter and more resourceful and all of this leads to good animal welfare Being part of a strong team Even an experienced animal technician cannot do their job completely alone It is not just about having the correct number of people to cover the quantity of work but also about them supporting each other having different ideas in each scenario and bringing different skills to the table Together the correct team should manage to fulfill their work within the unit efficiently The first few years of a trainee animal technician s career are possibly the most important in relation to their learning as they will constantly be picking up new skills and information Their team will be the ones who teach them these skills and introduce them to the industry because a lot of it will be completely new concepts It is likely every animal technician starting off within the industry has at one point or another come across a novel situation and struggled but with the support of their team they should manage to overcome it Being part of a well formed team will also help technicians develop socially and prepare them for later roles they may have further down their career path Commitment An animal technician regardless of experience should be fully committed to the job It is not an easy job nor is it always pleasant and it takes a lot from an individual to do but it does need doing If the work becomes hard it still needs completing because it may well impact on the animal s health if certain tasks are missed or ignored Ideally there should be suitable measures taken to ensure the work never becomes too tough but every unit has its bad days and on those days animal technicians will need to step up to the challenge It is not just the animals that technicians need to commit to but also their team and this means spreading the tasks evenly This involves covering a fair share of weekend and evening work as well as doing a great number of repetitive jobs If a trainee animal technician wants to truly make a career within the industry then unfortunately they also have to commit to the worse parts about the industry They must be prepared to see animals in a state of distress one day perform procedures that may cause 59

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 AS ET Congress 2017 Bursary Competition Essays distress and eventually humanely kill animals Without confronting these issues they cannot help improve such situations Willing to listen and follow instructions A trainee animal technician may have years of relevant experience in similar fields and may have read everything they can before starting their role but at the end of the day they are still new to an industry that is centuries in the making As a result their roles should be determined by more experienced members of staff with a greater knowledge of their unit and the trainee animal technician should follow their advice and instructions A technician who does not listen or follow instructions is likely to make mistakes but that is not to say that they should not be allowed to have an opinion or voice it It is not just listening to instructions but advice as well because everyone has learnt to do techniques in their own way and by listening to more experienced staff an individual can learn the basics of one technique then use what they have learnt from others to make it more efficient for themselves It can feel overwhelming being in a large facility with advanced technology and amazing research going on while being stuck doing the most basic tasks but skills and experience are built upon the basics Empathy When all is said and done the most important aspect of being a trainee animal technician is the animals themselves and putting their welfare first This can be done by showing empathy towards them and putting yourself in their situation Then somebody can understand the situation their animals are in and hope to do everything they can to improve upon it It is not just about not wanting to harm the animals but wanting to go above and beyond by learning about the species and their likes and dislikes Then animal technicians can provide the best standard of living for their animals possible within their unit In addition a trainee animal technician should also uphold this standard of welfare by reporting any malpractice to the relevant people to prevent it happening again Essentially a trainee animal technician should work to the standard that after health and safety the animals always come first This should not just be a legal obligation but a moral one as well 60 Page 60

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 April 2017 Page 61 Animal Technology and Welfare Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made SILKE KLEEFELD Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics National University of Ireland Galway Ireland Correspondence silke kleefeld nuigalway ie The most important aspect within a job as trainee technician is a love of animals which goes beyond being fond of pet animals and for me is a prerequisite to be able to regard them as sentinel beings which can not only experience pain and distress but also pleasure and happiness This love should spark a deep interest in learning and expanding one s knowledge on the physiology natural behaviour and welfare of the animals one is working with both in a practical and theoretical way The practical way needs to include observing the animals patiently in their own environment i e their home cage pen or tank without disturbing them in order to learn how to distinguish their normal behaviour from behaviour expressed when in pain or distress Besides the normal every day activities of cleaning cages and providing fresh food and water tending to the health and welfare of the animals should involve some quiet time where no activity is taking place within an animal holding room and the animals can simply be observed and listened to without being disturbed or agitated It is in those quiet times that subtle changes in behaviour for example the onset of stereotypical behaviour or cage biting may be detected rather than during times when an animal is taken out of their secure environment and handled for either husbandr y procedures experimental procedures or simple health checks as especially prey animals like rats mice and rabbits are innately equipped to hide injury and ill health from potential predators This practical learning needs to be supplemented with gaining theoretical knowledge through courses like the Institute of Animals Technology IAT diploma reading publications on animal behaviour and welfare and to exchange knowledge with other animal technicians All this is essential in recognising animals in pain and distress but also to recognise content and happy animals which is important if one aims to improve the health and welfare of laboratory animals This leads to the second key aspect which would be important for trainee animal technicians Trainee animal technicians should have the interest and initiative to engage in continuous professional development and education Formal education like working through the Level 2 to 6 Diplomas of the IAT is a recommended way to continuously improve one s knowledge on different aspects of animal health and welfare as well as on managing animal facilities and complying with relevant legislation This should be supplemented by attending seminars and conferences networking with technicians from other institutions researching websites and scientific publications Especially networking and communicating with other technicians either from the same facility or other facilities is an important way of exchanging knowledge and experiences Getting involved within the IAT branches or even becoming a youth representative of the relevant IAT branch should be something all trainee technicians should strongly take into consideration As a third key aspect trainee technicians should be interested in the relevant research projects which are ongoing within their individual unit This can be done by reading the project applications especially the nontechnical summary to learn about the rationale of the project as well as to learn about the procedures planned to be carried out on the animals and expected adverse effects Alternatively communicating directly with the researchers by asking them to explain what is happening to the animal can give good insight on the practical aspect of the animal research Only in this way is a technician in the position to judge if the welfare of an animal is compromised or not and can take action accordingly ideally in collaboration with the researcher with the aim of learning from things that went wrong and improving refining the same in the future A good working relationship and collaboration between researchers and technical staff should be fostered within every facility as only the combined knowledge of the research and the technical staff can really advance the refinement of procedures and the improvement of animal welfare 61

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 AS ET Congress 2017 Bursary Competition Essays The fourth key aspect is that all trainee technicians should get familiar with the European Directive associated guidelines and the requirements of the Home Office or the Health Protection Regulatory Agency HPRA in order to help to ensure that their unit is complying with current legislation Complying with current legislative requirements ensures that every effort is made to meet the 3Rs but also to record and report everything that happened to an animal during their lifetime i e documenting their life time experience This will lead to more transparency and openness of animal research for the general public by providing information on what is happening within animal laboratories and through justification regarding what is happening to the animals in order to advance medical research Animal technicians should be able to talk openly about their jobs within the public as well as amongst friends and family rather than having the feeling they need to hide what they are doing Last but not least the job of a technician is not always exciting like hands on animal handling and contact but to a great extent requires the staff to carry out relative unspectacular routine tasks every day including cage washing cleaning and tidying of rooms as well as feeding and watering of the animals and checking environmental parameters of the holding rooms Even so these jobs are unexciting and often do not seem to be very appealing they are an essential and very important part of caring for animals It ensures that their basic requirements and rights i e to be in a safe clean and warm environment and to be free of thirst and hunger are met It is therefore important that trainee technicians see the value and importance of these basic routine tasks and realise that they are contributing to the overall care and welfare of the animals rather than being discouraged or bored It is the combination of such a variety of tasks from administrative and regulatory work to tending to the health and welfare of the animals to supporting interesting research projects which makes being an animal technician such a fulfilling job 62 Page 62

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 63 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made JADE BACON University of Cambridge Metabolic Research Laboratories Metabolic Diseases Unit Level 4 Wellcome Trust MRC Institute of Metabolic Science Box 289 Addenbrookes Hospital Cambridge CB2 0QQ Correspondence jab271 cam ac uk In the role of a trainee animal technician the five most important aspects of the position follow a similar vein to that of the five freedom requirements Fundamentally on this basis the five most important points which I feel are required by any trainee animal technician to be discussed are 1 Behaviour Knowledge of the species you are working with and their natural behaviours 2 Husbandry Ensure the animals husbandr y conditions are maintained and requirements are met 3 Food and water Ensure the animals have adequate food water and high levels of hygiene are maintained 4 Handling Experience in handling all life stages including those with differing health statuses 5 Record keeping Keep strict accurate up to date records of the animals including health status and experimental history each individual s behaviour will differ slightly Getting to know these traits is useful when caring for the animals to ensure they are healthy and suffer as little distress as possible 2 Husbandry Being familiar with their behaviour also ties in with the point of adequate husbandr y In a research environment it can be difficult to fulfil the animals full repertoire of natural behaviours Therefore as far as possible the environment provided should aim to allow the mice to exhibit their natural behaviour such as scatter feeding as they naturally forage in the wild 3 2 Being social animals they live in groups consequently if there is a need for animals to live in single housing husbandry conditions will need to be altered to reduce the amount of potential distress from living in isolation by providing additional bedding to give additional heat and aid nesting behaviour 5 6 Both of these measures help to ensure the animals are free from pain injury disease and discomfort 1 Behaviour In animal research in the UK the model most commonly used is the mouse Mus musculus 1 Being prey animals noticing when they are in pain or distress can be more difficult as they are predisposed to concealing vulnerability 2 Therefore noticing any subtle behavioural changes is an important pre cursor to potential health or welfare issues and whether further medical attention is needed Signs include abnormal gait favouring certain limbs aggression or isolation piloerrection polydipsia or inappetence 3 This includes the acquired knowledge of strains in the facility as some may be prone to certain behavioural traits such as aggression or susceptibility to stress potentially leading to health issues or reduced food and water intake 3 Individuals have different personalities and Diabetic mice such as PCG1B ob ob and AXO144 B6 ob ob are prone to frequent urination so may need more frequent cleaning than other strains to maintain good hygiene and welfare 7 Equally breeding females will need care to cause minimal disturbance particularly with newborn litters as stress may affect their breeding success or may cause them to eat their litters 8 3 Food and water Food and water are essential requirements for any living being and some animals such as diabetic mice may drink more than others due to frequent urination Equally breeding animals may require a different diet to stock animals and pregnant or nursing females may 63

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 64 AS ET Congress 2017 Bursary Competition Essays eat more 3 Some individuals may be on a high fat or specialised diet for a research study In view of this amount consumed or food spoilage due to the length of time exposed to the atmosphere needs to be considered when providing food and how regularly it will need to be replenished and changed 9 3 On average a mouse consumes 4 8g of food and 5 8ml of water daily 9 Use of PPE is important to maintain hygiene and reduce the likelihood of disease spreading 7 4 Handling Correct handling of animals is important and will depend on the age and health status of the animal 3 For example obese strains or pregnant females would benefit more from a scooping cupping technique which allows the full bodyweight to be suppor ted a technique which can also be adopted for transfer of pups older or injured individuals 3 10 Alternatively other individuals can be handled by holding the tail base to lift the mouse temporarily scruffing the animal or supporting the weight on a sur face The animal should feel secure at all times with stress levels kept to a minimum 10 If the technician handling the animal is nervous then the animal will sense this and it can cause stress to the animal and may affect experiment outcomes 3 If a technician is new it is ideal to practice on individuals of good temperament who are used to being handled 5 Record keeping Whilst keeping accurate up to date records is a strict legal requirement of the Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 ASPA it is still good practice as part of duty of care to the animals Daily check sheets to ensure each animal is checked at least once and environmental parameters such as temperature 19 23 C and humidity 55 along with other aspects of their macro and micro environment is important to maintain in order to prevent distress or illness and disease such as ringtail from low humidity and high temperature 3 11 Individuals on observation for illness or injury on certain medication or on post operative surgery care should have notifications on their cage cards so they receive adequate care 12 This also ensures that in the event the main technician is absent cover staff will be able to adequately cover the duties of that room 12 strain schedule study or procedures performed will also be a helpful indicator as to whether any health issues are unexpected or expected In conclusion I feel that whilst there are many important aspects of an animal technician s job these five aspects form the skeleton structure for the foundation of a good technician References 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Cage cards are important to keep up to date As they contain all the details of the animals in the cage and their experimental history Including the sex number health status study number 19 b schedule user cage number and individuals identification along with any regulated procedures performed 12 This would include the date and the personal licence number of the person performing the procedure 12 This allows anyone to know exactly who to inform about changes in any of the animals health or behaviour Depending on 64 12 Understanding Animal Research 2016 Types of animals http www understandinganimalresearch org uk animals types animals last update 27 October 2015 Date accessed 14th September 2016 Brinkerhoff R J Haddad N M and Orrock J L 2005 Corridors and olfactor y predator cues affect small mammal behaviour Journal of Mammalogy 86 4 662669 Barnett S 2001 Introduction to Animal Technology 2nd Ed London Blackwell Science V ikar V K ks S Vasar E and Rauvala H 2001 Strain and gender differences in the behaviour of mouse lines commonly used in transgenic studies Physiology Behaviour 72 1 2 271 281 Kalliokoski O Teilmann A C Jacobsen K R Abelson K S P and Hau J 2014 The Lonely Mouse Single Housing Affects Serotonergic Signaling Integrity Measured by 8 OH DPAT Induced Hypothermia in Male Mice http www ncbi nlm nih gov pmc ar ticles PMC4249803 last update unknown Date accessed 13th September 2016 Deacon 2006 Assess nest building in mice http www ncbi nlm nih gov pubmed 17406392 last update unknown Date accessed 14th September 2016 WFB West Forvie Building 2016 SOP s and Procedures Cambridge Cambridge University Weber E M Osslon A S and Algers B 2007 High mortality rates among newborn laboratory mice is it natural and which are the causes https actavetscand biomedcentral com articles 10 11 86 1751 0147 49 S1 S8 last update unknown Date accessed 13th September 2016 Fawcett A 2012 Guidelines for the Housing of Mice in Scientific Institutions http www animalethics org au __ data assets pdf_file 0004 249898 Guideline 22mouse housing pdf last update unknown Date accessed 13th September 2016 Buerge T and Weiss T 2004 Handling and restraint http www usp br bioterio Artigos Procedimentos 20e xperimentais Handling 3 pdf last update unknown Date accessed 13th September 2016 Recordati C Basta S M Benedetti L Baldin F Capillo M Scanzani E and Gobbi A 2015 Pathologic and Environmental Studies Provide New Pathogenetic Insights Into Ringtail of Laboratory Mice Veterinary Pathology 52 4 700 711 Home Office 2014 Guidance on the operation of the Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 https www gov uk government uploads system uploads attachment_data file 291350 Guidance_on_the_ Operation_of_ASPA pdf last update unknown Date accessed 13th September 2016

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 April 2017 Page 65 Animal Technology and Welfare Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made JUSTYNA BARRATT University of Cambridge John Van Geest Centre for Brain Repair Forvie Site Robinson Way Cambridge CB2 0PY Correspondence jmp215 cam ac uk Nearly three million animals are used in research each year in the UK The industry is tightly regulated by the Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 ASPA The Act acknowledges the necessity of using animals in research but demands a high level of protection for them in order to minimise their suffering 1 Animal technicians are responsible for the care and welfare of laboratory animals used in scientific and medical research The work contributes to developing treatments for diseases and new methods of diagnosis The five most important aspects of a trainee animal technician s job are Animal health and welfare Monitoring health status is a continuous process Every time on a morning check every time a cage is passed every time an animal is removed from its cage and every time it is fed or watered or being cleaned it should be observed for signs of ill health In order to detect signs of illness or pain in an animal it is necessary to have knowledge of its normal appearance and behaviour Sick animals are not good experimental models as the disease causes physiological changes in their body which can affect the way they respond to a experimental procedure Also sick animals do not breed well and they produce weak and sick young The other purpose of health monitoring is to supply the researcher with data on variables that might influence the outcome of an experiment It is important to record any signs of illness or disease and report them to a Named Animal Care and Welfare Officer NACWO or Named Veterinar y Surgeon NVS as they make decisions on what action can be taken The animal could be treated to minimise suffering or it may be humanely killed An animal technician s responsibility is to ensure that any animal in poor health is identified at the earliest possible moment to prevent unnecessary suffering reduce the spread of infection or disease and prevent invalidating experimental results Routine animal husbandry procedures One of the most important routine tasks is to ensure the animals are kept clean and comfortable This involves regular cleaning and changing bedding material Animals benefit from any item of interest in their environment but the cage or pen should never be so filled that movement of the animal is restricted Enrichment helps animals to act as naturally as possible increasing their ability to cope with any stress and stops unwanted behaviour An animal technician s responsibility is to ensure that the animals always have access to food and water The amount of food and water provided to any cage or pen depends on the species and the numbers of animals that occupy it In the wild most species find their food on the ground In captivity in order to keep the food clean and to try to prevent wastage diet is normally presented in containers or food hoppers to accommodate the animals feeding behaviour and the type of food they eat Animal technicians must be able to handle sex and restrain the animals in their care without harming them and putting themselves at risk of injury Regular handling helps to reduce stress in animals and calm them down before any procedure on them is performed Also animals that are handled well soon get used to it and often seek human contact Checking the environmental conditions The animals kept in laboratory animal units have a limited opportunity to control their environment and they are dependent on us to control it for them All 65

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 66 AS ET Congress 2017 Bursary Competition Essays environment factors can affect the animals Noise is unwanted sound and should be kept to minimum as this can cause a great deal of stress to the animal fits and decrease reproduction The temperature and humidity are also closely linked and should be carefully controlled and monitored at least once a day Any sudden changes in temperature and humidity can cause different kinds of illness Ever y animal technician should know the optimum range temperature and humidity for the species they care for Also in many units all light is artificial and can therefore be strictly controlled Photoperiod is the length of time the animals are exposed to light during a day The reproductive cycle of many species is controlled by day length as this affects circulating hormone levels Most laboratory animals are active at night so by using reverse lighting cycles we can observe the animals during our normal working hours and disturb the animal s natural rhythms much less Light intensity is also important as this may affect the eyes of some laboratory animals more than the others and Schedule 1 or other culling Keeping health records allows us to track the animal s health throughout a study and assess whether experimental results have been affected Records can also be used as a prompt for another technician to check for progress of any disease state or recovery from it Effectively carrying out written and spoken communication skills helps when dealing with other people who are also involved in animal research It also improves team work decision making and problem solving Animal technicians have a duty of care to look after the animals and ensure their welfare is priority This means that they must keep a vigilant eye out for any signs of illness pain or distress in the animals that they look after Animal research is strictly regulated in the UK and high levels of animal welfare required are as well as understanding the Law and trying to improve the quality of life for laboratory animals Reference 1 Hygiene and safety Hygienic conditions are achieved by routine cleaning sterilisation and disinfection This reduces the amount of organisms bacteria etc that may cause disease The animal technician s duty is to provide a healthy and clean environment for animals and people within the animal facility It is absolutely necessary to wash hands with soap and water before entering the animal facility Personal protective clothing should be worn whenever entering an animals housing area or whenever animals are handled Also wearing a mask and gloves minimises the risk of developing animal related allergies and exposure to zoonotic disease Any worktops or other surfaces should be kept clean and treated with suitable disinfectant as soon as work has been completed We must remember to carry out all procedures with the highest standard of hygiene and follow all health and safety rules PPE must be worn at all the times to prevent the spread of disease and keep animals and humans safe and healthy In some institutions you may be required to read and understand documents and SOPs that specifically tell you how a job or procedure is carried out in a way that is safe and approved Organisational and communication skills including record keeping Good organisational skills are essential for animal technicians who need to balance different duties They must have the ability to prioritise their daily jobs and make sure that the animals health is not compromised Also good organisational skills are necessary to make sure that an accurate record of all of the animals cared for are kept in place as well as records of checking temperature humidity breeding regulated procedures 66 Barnett S 2001 Introduction to Animal Technology 2nd Ed London Blackwell Science

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 67 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare Describe the five aspects of a trainee animal technician s job that you think are the most important in each case justify the choice you have made JESS CLARK MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology Ares Building Babraham Research Campus Babraham Cambridge CB22 3AT Correspondence jclark mrc lmb cam ac uk I think that the 5 aspects most important to an animal technicians job are animal welfare animal husbandry training record keeping and enjoying your job for these reasons and how we can strive to improve the welfare of the animals by keeping up to date with current standards and the 3R s principles Animal husbandry Animal welfare It is important to ensure that you have a good knowledge and understanding of animal welfare The animals we work with are living animals with needs they require us to be able to know when they are well and when they are not if they are in any pain and whether or not they are healthy It is also important technician s know how to look after animals correctly It is up to the technicians to be able to identify an animal that is sick or stressed and are able to deal with it appropriately or contact the correct person to sort out the problem It is important as an animal technician that the animals that we work with are checked every day to ensure that any abnormalities can be picked up as soon as possible and the animals aren t left for longer than 24 hours without being checked Any problems could be detrimental to the science being researched The animals rely on us to use our knowledge to make sure that they have the best care and that they have the best quality of life whilst they are in our care It is important to ensure that the animals are never experiencing unnecessary suffering and that they are able to express as much normal behaviour as possible Some of the factors that ensure this is adhered to are correct housing a normal environment the right diet and providing the right number of companions or cage mates Other aspects such as suitable environmental conditions for the animals needs are also all part of animal welfare for example the temperature they live in Awareness of animal welfare is an important part of being an animal technician As trainee technicians we should be able to understand what animal welfare is how we can affect the animals that we look after on a daily basis We are responsible for making sure the animals we look after have a good life whilst they are with us making sure they are cleaned out health checked have food and water available amongst many other husbandry aspects Without us the animals wouldn t be able to survive We must ensure that the animals have the best standard of living and that we are able to understand the differences in the species that we work with in order to give them the best quality of life possible The scientific results achieved will be more accurate if the animals are kept in good standardised conditions and are looked after properly Keeping them comfor table in their surroundings ensures that everyone else is satisfied with what they achieve Things such as giving the animals the right enrichment in their pens cage the amount of food they get every day and how often to clean them out are all things that are part of animal husbandry We must also make sure that we maintain the barrier so that all the animals have a clean health status This is to ensure that all the animals are of the same health status when they are being used so that contamination does not affect the outcome of the science Training As a trainee animal technician it is important to try and learn as much as possible Training means that we become more knowledgeable and are able to progress in our careers and learn new skills shadowing people and working in different environments means that we are always learning new things and it is important that you are pro active and willing to learn as many new things as possible There is a lot to learn as an animal 67

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 AS ET Congress 2017 Bursary Competition Essays technician and when you first start out there are so many new and exciting things to learn most importantly how to look after the animals in your care You should be prepared for new challenges and new tasks as they come along often Attending college courses and day courses gives technicians the opportunity to learn more about their area of work Going to talks and conferences could lead to meeting other people in the industry that could be at the same level and experience as you or are more advanced and are able to broaden your knowledge of your job as they are likely to work in different areas and with different animals which can be interesting to learn about Understanding the job and the reasons why we do certain things is also important getting to know researchers and learning about their projects gives a greater understanding to the job and highlights the importance of caring for the animals correctly and can give us more information on particular aspects of our job Record keeping We have to do a lot of record keeping as animal technicians and it is important that we record and keep records of everything we do in case we need the information again This also ensures that we comply with Home Office regulations For example it is important to know what procedures a certain animal has had done or how an animal is breeding what drugs an animal needs and what side effects they might give This is to ensure that we get consistent and accurate results Knowing which animal is which is extremely important so that the right animal is always being used when needed for example a certain study may require an animal with a certain genotype or phenotype This is done by extensive record keeping and getting this wrong would be extremely detrimental to any results We are recording information every day sometimes by hand and sometimes on computers but it is important that we are able to get access to this information whenever we need it and that the right information is recorded for the right animals doing this incorrectly could seriously effect results Enjoying the work The animals we work with are living and breathing and it is important that we enjoy the work that we do so that we do it to the best standard that we can and so that the animals are well looked after and cared for to the best of our ability Getting involved in training programmes and making friends is important so that we enjoy our job and get good job satisfaction If you do not enjoy your job then you are likely to make mistakes and therefore you are putting the animals health and welfare at risk By enjoying what you are doing you are more likely to do a good job than if you do not enjoy it Happy technicians mean content and relaxed animals which in turn is more likely to achieve good results 68 Page 68

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 69 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare CONGRESS 2016 PLATFORM PRESENTATION ABSTRACTS Congress platform presentations provide important information for technologists and researchers However not all platform presenters provide a full paper for publication and although abstracts are printed in the Congress Handbook which is also available on the IAT website http www iat org uk congresshandbook the editorial board is aware that not all readers can access it It has therefore been decided that for the foreseeable future abstracts will be printed in ATW in addition to being available on the website Where papers based on Congress 2016 platform presentations have been printed in Animal Technology and Welfare the full reference is given 1 Open labs school science week why you should open your doors management levels within most organisations become either responsible for or involved in the assessment and procurement of goods Procurement planning is a process whereby a detailed strategic plan needs to be set out in advance with a schedule and team to agree to what which when and how purchases are to be conducted in a given period This plan considers what is to be procured this can be for goods works or services which method of procurement to be used based on regulated and institutional financial thresholds and when and how the processing steps will be conducted This presentation discusses procurement in general and relates to this with an indepth overview of the process involved in procuring major pieces of equipment with the aim to demonstrate how specialised skills need to be utilised to achieve a successful outcome Heather Sanders MIAT HNC in Animal Technology RAnTech 3 Procurement planning Director of Biomedical Services University of Leicester PO Box 138 Leicester LE1 9HN Stowers Institute for Medical Research 1000 E 50th Street Kansas City Missouri 64110 USA Launched during National Science Week 15th to 24th March 2014 Open Labs is a three year programme during which hundreds of school children will tour research facilities meet scientists and veterinarians and will importantly see the animals at the centre of research The University of Leicester has taken part in this initiative for the last two years and over this time has hosted a total of 12 visits with more than 100 students and 12 teachers visiting Two of the students went on to undertake work experience giving us further opportunity to demonstrate the importance of the work conducted in the unit The students and I will describe the planning and resources required to manage the programme the highs lows and humorous sides to the visits from both perspectives together with the outcomes for the University in support of the Concordat on Openness in Animal Research which the University signed up to in 2012 For decades the majority of advances in biomedical research relied on the use of a limited number of well characterised model organisms In recent years new technologies have greatly lowered the barriers to establish new models allowing researchers the choice of multitudes of exotic species that fit their specific investigative needs This talk aims to address some of the questions that should be asked when planning for non traditional species and some pitfalls to avoid Diana Baumann BSc Hons RLATG CMAR 4 The Home Office Update ASRU latest news Sue Houlton MA BVSc DVR DVC MRCVS 1 and Will Reynolds BSc Hons MPhil 2 1 2 2 Procurement planning Chief Inspector Animals in Science Regulation Unit Home Office Marsham Street London SW1P 4DF Head of Policy Planning Animals in Science Regulation Unit Home Office 2 Marsham Street London SW1P 4DF Pete C Willan DMS FInstMgt MIAT Professional Consultant Laboratory Animal Facilities NexPage Solutions It has become standard practice for some time that Animal Technicians who rise to senior or As gatekeepers for the use of live animals in research Animals in Science Regulation Unit ASRU officials will provide updates on some key current items Most recent news will cover points on the current wider European perspective including the forthcoming review 69

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 70 Congress 2016 Platform Presentation Abstracts of the implementation of the Directive as well as matters on the home front Changes within ASRU as a result of Judy MacArthur Clark s impending retirement will be highlighted insofar as they might affect external stakeholders especially licence holders In addition the presentation will cover externally facing issues such as ongoing implementation of the electronic licensing system managing peaks and troughs in licensing demands increasing consistency in licensing and advice to duty holders and our current communication programme covering policy and other matters 5 The NC3Rs promoting animal welfare and supporting technicians an overview members to follow ensuring that each accesses the most appropriate materials The Road Map pack is linked to AWERB tasks and is aimed at local AWERBs or animal care and use or ethics committees It comprises shor t presentations with notes and workshop materials that can be used to help establishments audit their procedures and focus on refining any that can cause sever suffering The IAT and animal technologists assisted with the development of the web pages and Road Map and the RSPCA would like to encourage animal technologists to bring the resources to the attention of their establishments for example by making the AWERB or Named Persons aware of them Although they address severe suffering much of the content will help with refinement in general We would also appreciate feedback on the approach and content of the resources to inform future updates Vicky Robinson CBE Chief Executive National Centre for the 3Rs NC3Rs Gibbs Building 215 Euston Road London NW1 2BE Improving animal welfare is at the heart of the NC3Rs remit Over the last ten years we have invested in research that provides an evidence base for refinement as well as resources to help ensure that best practice is adopted on the ground This presentation describes examples from the NC3Rs portfolio as well as some of the challenges for improving animal welfare that exist The focus will be on a range of species and technologies and includes examples from academia and industry 6 RSPCA focus on severe suffering Penny Hawkins BSc PhD Deputy Head Research Animals Department RSPCA Wilberforce Way Southwater West Sussex RH13 9RS The Research Animals Department has an ongoing project on reducing and avoiding severe suffering which has been well supported by the Institute of Animal Technology IAT This presentation describes two new initiatives an online information resource science rspca org uk sciencegroup researchanimals severesuffering and a Road Map pack designed to help establishments act on severe suffering at a local level The web based resource Focus on Severe Suffering is endorsed by the IAT the Laboratory Animal Science Association LASA and the Laboratory Animal Veterinary Association LAVA It sets out the factors that can contribute towards making a procedure severe explains how these can be addressed and links to other websites and downloads for fur ther information and practical guidance There are separate pathways for Animal Technologists researchers and the Animal Welfare and Ethical Review Body AWERB 70 Reference Hawkins P 2016 The RSPCA focus on severe suffering Animal Technology and Welfare Vol 15 No 2 August 2016 89 91 7 Going outside ASPA Guidelines Peter Gardiner University of Bristol Dorothy Hodgkin Building Whitson Street Bristol BS1 3NY In every animal unit we all have to work within the Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 amended 2012 ASPA However it is also important to be able to adapt and work some flexibility into the guidelines to enhance animal welfare and acquire better results This talk will describe the improved and refined technique working and caring for a group of diabetic mice Working as a team of animal technicians academics and the Named Veterinary Surgeon we developed a new husbandry care regime to improve the welfare of a group of Streptozotocin induced mice resulting in diabetes and hypertension and given Doxycyline for gene control The mice were also housed in metabolic cages to collect urine samples During the experiment we found this particular strain of mice did not handle the metabolic cage and drug induction particularly well therefore we revised and refined the experimental protocol with advice from our named veterinary surgeon and found with the changes in place the mice coped far better with the experiment Some changes included the metabolic cage room being set at a higher temperature than home office specifications enriched metabolic cages refining the way the drug was administered and increasing and intensifying the post experimental care of the animals incorporating animal technicians and academics working together to achieve a higher level of care and welfare of the animals which resulted in improved results and integrity of the experiment

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 71 Congress 2016 Platform Presentation Abstracts Reference Gardiner P 2016 Going outside ASPA Guidelines Animal Technology and Welfare Vol 15 No 1 April 2016 47 52 8 Enhancing the welfare of zebra finches with environmental enrichment Gordon Gray University of Glasgow Institute of Biodiversity Animal Health and Comparative Medicine Graham Kerr Building Glasgow G12 9QQ This presentation focusses on environmental enrichment for laboratory zebra finches I will give a brief introduction to zebra finches as a species as well as an overview of the current research involving them at Glasgow The main objective of my talk is to discuss how at Glasgow we have made alterations to the micro and macro environment and how these changes have positively impacted the welfare of our birds The key points are as follows enriching the cage environment photoperiod and light control sound and temperature This paper describes a study to investigate a husbandry protocol to improve the weaning weight and survival rate of an inbred congenic strain of rats The offspring of this established colony were backcrossed to WKY females in order to produce the required genotype A failure to thrive was observed when the pups reached 2 to 3 weeks of age It was observed that the pups who survived to weaning age exhibited stunted growth with weights ranging from 14 to 25g Following careful observation of subsequent litters it became apparent that the dam s milk production was either reduced or non existent when the pups reached approximately 2 weeks of age The pups were not mature enough to eat solids and they quickly lost weight and became dehydrated Since receiving an excellence in science award from Imperial College for this work earlier this year I have gone on to look at how the colony has coped over the past few years and how the pre wean loss rate has changed from the start up of the colony to now Reference Malton J 2016 Rat litters in trouble can they be helped Animal Technology and Welfare Vol 15 No 1 April 2016 43 46 Reference Gray G 2016 Enhancing welfare of zebra finches through the use of environmental enrichment Animal Technology and Welfare Vol 15 No 3 December 2016 147 150 9 Refining isolator welfare for nude mice Mel Crooks Envigo RMS UK Ltd Hillcrest Dodgeford Lane Belton Loughborough Leicestershire LE12 9TE In the CBS department at Envigo we house many animals for our clients One particular client houses Athymic nudes in our isolator suite The nature of these animals and the fact that they are immunocompromised and hairless causes some welfare concerns such as irritation to their eyes The main issue for us being the choice of bedding and its potential adverse effects on the animals As a consequence of these concerns we under took some research comparing different beddings available to choose the most suitable housing conditions for these animals to improve their welfare This project will highlight how we conducted this study and the results 10 Litters in trouble can they be helped ABTA 2016 winner Joanna Malton Imperial College London Hammersmith Campus Du Cane Road London W12 0NN KEVIN DOLAN MEMORIAL LECTURE 11 The influence of light on human and laboratory animal health and wellbeing Robert Dauchy MS CMAR RLATG Manager Laborator y of Chrono Neuroendocrine Oncology Tulane University School of Medicine 1430 Tulane Avenue New Orleans Louisiana 70112 2699 USA Light influences every major biological rhythm and impacts the health and wellbeing of all mammals All processes of metabolism and physiology follow circadian near 24 hour rhythms that are regulated by the master biological clock located in the brain In all species light is the single strongest time cue that resets this clock via the diurnal melatonin signal and synchronises timing of these processes Previous work from our laboratory showed that dark phase light contamination as sometimes occurs in laboratory animal facilities suppressed the normal night time melatonin signal and stimulated human tumour growth in tumour bearing animals This work provided the first bench top evidence in support of now over 18 major epidemiological studies showing that light at night leads to increased incidence of risk and growth of a variety of human cancers Currently we are examining 71

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 73 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare POSTER PRESENTATIONS Originally presented at IAT Congress 2016 What do research people really think about animal welfare NORMAN MORTELL Agenda Life Sciences PO Box 24 Hull HU12 8YJ Correspondence norman agenda rm co uk Previously exhibited at the 2016 LASA Winter Meeting Introduction An anonymous survey was conducted in 2015 with the primar y aim being to ascer tain how people working in the research sector feel about a range of uses of animals in society and to continue Agenda s ongoing Welfare First programme and Concordat commitments The research sector has been portrayed as uncaring by groups opposing ethical animal research and so the survey asked questions about specific animal welfare concerns The results were reviewed to ascertain whether some animal welfare issues are of more of a concern than others and also whether it is normal for research sector personnel to have concerns about animal welfare issues outside of the research environment Animalsinin Society Society Survey June 20152015 UseUse of of Animals Survey June Where alternatives to animals in research are validated and available they should be used I am 100 comfortable with the humane use of animal in research Killing animals for pest control reasons should be banned e g rats mice pigeons Culling wild animals to control populations should be banned e g deer Culling wild animals to control disease should be banned e g badgers We should keep cats indoors to stop them killing other small mammals and birds We should ban the use of animals in religious festivals Some animals should have citizenship human like rights specify which in comments All animals should have citizenship human like rights We should ban people from having pets I do not agree with the use of animals in sport e g horse dog racing I disagree with cosmetic testing I oppose the use of animals in TV adverts I oppose all forms of animal fighting cock bear dog etc The use of captive animals in zoos Safari parks Aquariums etc for entertainment should be banned for conservation purposes The use of captive animals in zoos Safari parks Aquariums etc for entertainment should be banned Animals in circuses should be banned We should not eat fish We should not eat meat We should not wear wool for clothing and or products Limitations The sample size of 312 people was relatively small public polls were used to gauge public opinion against a wide range of animal welfare issues This was difficult because the methodology is varied and unbiased public opinion to use as comparisons were difficult to find most The use of fur and leather for clothing should be stopped 1 0 2 0 3 0 4 0 5 0 6 0 7 0 8 0 I Completely Disagree 10 Completely Agree Survey Results Each of the 21 questions were rated from 1 completely disagree to 10 completely agree by the respondees The graph summarises the key findings The results were also assessed where it was possible against public opinion and allocated Green for higher than the public Amber for where it was not possible to find a direct comparison Blue for where the score was the same or very similar to the public view Red for where the responses were less concerned than the public 73 9 0 10 0

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 74 Poster Presentations internet based polls seek support for or against a particular issue The question that included both fur and leather could have been separated because people were more comfortable with leather than fur as it is a by product of the food sector Do you have any other comments about the way animals are used in society A free text question provided the opportunity to make comments about the use of animals in society and there were 130 comment responses These demonstrated a high level of animal welfare awareness and concern about animal welfare particularly in unregulated uses of animals The key comment topic areas were G there is a need to better understand individual animal species and behaviour G there should be more regulations e g pets and pest control G animal welfare initiatives should focus on animal rather than human emotion G the research sector still needs to be more open and constantly question G welfare should be for all species for all uses of animals and should be humane Conclusions The findings demonstrate that people in research do care about animal welfare across a wide range of animal uses in society The only area where the research sector appears less concerned about animal welfare than the public was around the question about eating meat In the majority of cases the research sector scored the same or higher than the public The highest scoring responses were G G G G 9 1 out of 10 support use of validated alternatives to animals 8 1 out of 10 are comfortable with humane use of animals in research 8 1 out of 10 disagree with cosmetic testing 7 5 out of 10 believe that animals in circuses should be banned Although relatively low scoring the responders showed higher concern thaan the public on the following issues G G G 74 4 2 out of 10 agreed that culling wild animals to control populations should be banned 4 8 out of 10 do not agree with the use of animals in sport e g horse dog racing 4 8 out of 10 agreed that the use of fur and leather for clothing should be stopped comments suggest that this would have been higher if relating solely to fur The results also show that it is normal for people to have welfare concerns outside of the research environment This may have hiring implications for example where a person is passionate about not using animals for fur but the campaigning animal welfare group they follow is also against ethical animal research This dynamic could impact upon hiring decisions if associations with animal welfare causes or groups deter the research sector from hiring people who in reality may share the normal concerns expressed by the responders in this survey Key conclusions This survey demonstrates that people in research are concerned about a wide range of animal uses in society and in many cases show more concern than the public and that a passion for a welfare cause should not necessarily deter the research sector from hiring a person Download a copy of this poster www agenda rm co uk agenda cms uploads Agenda LASAPoster pdf

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 75 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare Effect of moderate environmental enrichment on commonly used behavioural tests in rats SILKE KLEEFELD KAREN BANNERTON and JOHN KELLY Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics National University of Ireland Galway Ireland Corresponding author silke kleefeld nuigalway ie Introduction Experimental groups The environment that laboratory animals are housed in should reflect their natural habitats in a manner that can satisfy their innate physiological and behavioural needs This includes nest building hiding exploring and foraging 1 Paper Bedding Paper Bedding Environmental Enrichment Environmental Enrichment Providing environmental enrichment EE in order to achieve this is both a legal and an ethical requirement However EE may affect behavioural tests commonly used in rodents This project was designed to assess the effect of introducing a moderate EE protocol on a range of behavioural tests in rats namely G G G G anxiety elevated plus maze EPM2 depression forced swim test FST3 learning and memory morris water maze MWM4 pain hotplate test HPT 5 Playing hiding tubes EE chosen consisted of nesting material hiding playing tubes as well as nutritional supplements to encourage foraging Materials and methods Animals Adult singly housed at Day 0 male Sprague Dawley rats 11 weeks old at the start of testing Nesting materials Bedding 3Rs LAB Bedding Nutritional supplements 75

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 77 April 2017 Animal Technology and Welfare Instructions to Authors Subjects considered for publication may include original articles technical notes and reviews pertaining to all aspects of animal science and technology management and education The Editorial Board wishes to offer par ticular encouragement to papers leading to improvements in environmental enrichment the general care and welfare of the animals used in particular those species and strains exhibiting harmful genetic defects and papers describing refinements in techniques a reduction in the number of animals that need to be used or alternatives to animal use Papers describing experimental procedures will only be accepted for publication if authors clearly state that the procedures conform to the prevailing principles and Codes of Practice of the Animals Scientific Procedures Act 1986 Papers submitted from outside the U K should state what legislation and or ethical approval the work has been carried out under In addition authors who describe surgical techniques with recovery should include details of post operative care and any analgesic therapy provided All submissions should follow the ARRIVE Animal Research Repor ting of In Vivo Experiments guidelines Kilkenny C Browne WJ Cuthill IC Emerson M Altman DG 2010 Improving Bioscience Research Repor ting The ARRIVE Guidelines for Reporting Animal Research PLOS Biol 8 6 e1000412 doi 10 1371 journal pbio 1000412 The Editorial Board reser ves the right to seek independent advice on any aspect of the content of an article but the final decision on acceptance or rejection remains with the Board to the address below together with a copy on disk CD or DVD All sheets should be typewritten on one side in double spacing and serially numbered Any photographs or graphs should be supplied as originals and conform to the format in 4 below Address for submission Journal Editorial Board Chairman 5 South Parade Summertown Oxford OX2 7JL No responsibility will be accepted for loss or damage to such articles Electronic files of submissions are required together with separate files of photographs and any graphics that appear in the manuscript Electronic submissions should be sent via email via atw iat org uk alternatively manuscript plus two copies may be sent as hard copy to the address below All sheets should be typewritten on one side in double spacing with 4 cm margins and serially numbered Additionally a copy on disk should be provided or sent by email via atw iat org uk Articles for submission should be sent to Journal Editorial Board Chairman 5 South Parade Summertown Oxford OX2 7JL No responsibility will be accepted for loss or damage to such articles Format Submission Material submitted for publication will be considered provided that it is contributed exclusively to Animal Technology and becomes the property of the Institute of Animal Technology Articles may be submitted either electronically or by hard copy as follows Electronic Articles should be submitted in Word format with double spacing to the lines and all pages serially numbered Any photographs or graphs must be submitted as separate files and conform to the format in point 4 below The relevant ar ticle must clearly indicate where photographs and or graphs are to be inserted Address for submission atw iat org uk Hard copy The original manuscript plus two copies should be sent 1 The first sheet of the article should contain the following i the full title of the paper ii the initials and last name of the author s iii the full address of the depar tment s and institution s where the work was carried out iv the address for correspondence if different to above 2 For the remainder of the paper the text should be clear and concise and where appropriate sub divided under the following headings i ii iii iv v vi vii Summary Introduction Methods Results Discussion Acknowledgements References 3 Measurements should be given in metric units see The use of S I Units 1969 British Standards Institution publication and spelling should follow that of the Oxford xi

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APRIL latest e S Animal Technology and Welfare 9 3 17 07 54 Page 78 Instructions to Authors English Dictionary Abbreviations must be defined in full at their first appearance in the text The 24 hour clock should be used for times Words to appear in italic type should be underlined Designation of inbred strains should be in accordance with the International Index of Laboratory Animals 6th edition compiled edited and published by M W Festing 1993 e g Gregory J A 1985 Principles of Animal Husbandry In Laboratory Animals An Introduction for Experimenters Second Edition Tuffrey A A John Wiley Sons Ltd Chichester 87 105 Papers accepted for publication but not yet published should be included in the list of references followed by in press Papers in preparation personal communications and unpublished observations should be referred to as such in the text only 4 Photographs should have clear and well contrasted tone values and be in colour All illustrations charts e g histograms and graphs and photographs should be submitted separately and bear on the reverse side the author s name a number corresponding to the order in which it appears in the text e g Figure 1 and an arrow pointing to the top Content Illustrations charts and photographs supplied on disk should be in JPEG TIFF or EPS formats and have a resolution of no less than 300dpi Animals The captions for illustrations charts and photographs should be typed in double spacing in numerical order on a separate sheet of paper 5 References Only essential references should be included Authors are responsible for verifying them against the original source material ATW uses the Vancouver referencing system references should be identified in the text by superscript Arabic numbers e g 12 after any punctuation and numbered and listed at the end of the paper in the order of when they are first cited in the text Automatic numbering should be avoided References should include the names and initials of up to six authors If there are more than six authors only the first three should be named followed by et al Publications for which no author is apparent may be attributed to the organisation from which they originate Simply omit the name of the author for anonymous journal articles avoid using Anonymous References should be set out as follows Journals Surname and initials of author s date title of article Name of journal in full volume number first and last page numbers e g Saigeman S 1998 Environmental enhancement of cats what why how Animal Technology Vol 49 No 3 145 154 Books Surname and initials of author s date title of book Name of publisher Town of publisher Papers describing procedures involving the use of animals should always include full details of the animals and husbandry conditions used These would be as follows Species Breed or strain Sex Age and weight at start of procedure Genetic status inbred outbred hybrid mutant Source Microbiological status conventional specified pathogen free define which pathogens animals are free from gnotobiotic define which micro organisms are present Quarantine or acclimatisation period Husbandry during procedure Type of housing material size cage type if relevant Number of animals per cage or unit Bedding type quality any pretreatment Type of system conventional barrier ventilated rack isolator Environmental temperature C range Relative Humidity range Lighting natural artificial state hours of light and dark Ventilation number of air changes per hour Period of acclimatisation before start of procedure Feed type composition any pretreatment amount frequency Water type quality any pretreatment amount frequency Scientific procedure Number of animals and any pretreatment Time of day of procedure s Quantity and frequency of any samples Statistics e g Flecknell P A 1987 Laborator y Anaesthesia Academic Press London Animal Chapter from a multi author book Surname and initials of chapter author s date title of chapter In title of book surname and initials of book editors Name of publisher Town of publisher first and last page numbers of chapter xii Tests used should be named Reprints Free reprints are no longer provided but the ATW Editorial Board are happy to provide PDF files of articles after publication Use of these files is subject to Copyright restrictions