Possibility of Research with Husbandry Training

Abstract

Husbandry training not only is useful for health care, but also can be applied widely to research and others. Husbandry training based on behavioral analysis brings extremely low invasiveness as a result and also is useful in a point of view of animal welfare. Those are the reasons why it becomes more important in the research at the zoo. In some zoos in Japan, husbandry training has been adopted, but it is currently limited to some staffs in charge and to some animal species. We have actively used husbandry training and already trained 50.9% of all the species for the palpation and subcutaneous injection. We presented about these techniques in the conference etc. Husbandry training has possibility to promote the researches peculiar to the zoo. In husbandry training, on the other hand, there are risks that basic rearing management becomes neglected. We think that husbandry training is a means but not a purpose. Husbandry training must become one of the techniques to play original roles of the zoo by using data acquired by husbandry training with the guarantee of animal welfare for studies.