What Should We Do About Animal Welfare?

Animal welfare is an issue that concerns us all. Recent advances in scientific understanding of welfare and proposals for ways of keeping animals have not fully reached the public domain. This book takes an informative approach aimed at raising the level of public debate and emphasising even though decisions are complex and compromise may sometimes be necessary, action can and should be taken now to improve animal welfare. Michael Appleby has been awarded the Universities Federation of Animal Welfare (UFAW) Hulme Fellowship to write this book.

Preface vi

Dedication viii

Chapter 1 Noah’s New Ark: Why should we do anything? 1

Chapter 2 Humans, animals and machines: Understanding animal welfare 19

Chapter 3 One big happy family: Differences between animals 45

Chapter 4 To have and to hold: Keeping and killing animals 65

Chapter 5 Made in our image: Selection and modification of animals 87

Chapter 6 Home is where the heart is: Housing and environments 113

Chapter 7 Give and take: Animal treatment 129

Chapter 8 Buying power: Individual action 149

Chapter 9 Votes and lobbies: Action by society 167

Appendix Some useful addresses 186

Index 188

"The earnest tone, completeness of the spectrum of animal uses discussed, and the simplicity and clarity of the prose and drawings all make this volume a good one to recommend to people who work with animals and need a quick primer in welfare. And readers who often encounter such animal workers might want to get a few extra copies to hand out."

Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics

Michael Calvert Appleby OBE is a British ethologist and animal welfare scientist, especially for farm animals. He obtained a BSc in Zoology at the University of Bristol and a PhD in Animal Behaviour at King's College, Cambridge.