SA国际传媒

We hope 2025 has treated you well. For us here in the Animal Behaviour and Welfare Research Group we have had a bumper year and we are supremely proud of the growth we have had! So we wanted to share a summary of what we have achieved with you, along with, of course, some Christmas cheer in the form of quirky facts (some truer than others!) and some truly questionnable Christmas jokes for you to share this festive season! 

A quick run-down of what we have achieved:

• Grown our research group - more information coming in the New Year but this year we have welcomed two staff to our group and four new postgraduates – one of those has moved from an MRes programme to a PhD programme
• Two PhD graduations – huge congratulations to Dr Juliana Garcia Alvarez (pictured below) and Dr Paul Crawford

• Six papers published (some are detailed here)
• A further 10 papers are in draft or in submission
• 13 grants submitted – of those two were successful generating income of £62,319.50 (these included a UFAW studentship and a BBSRC MIBTP studentship). We have two still awaiting decisions – wish us luck!
• At the very end of last year we had a further two grants awarded which amounted to £67,372.40 – that work was undertaken during this year and included an Innovate UK project and a BBSRC and AWRN funded project on developing validated wearable sensor technology for dairy goats
• Three internal grants from quality research funding (including a project on synthesising evidence in relation to human-mesocarnivore interactions in Africa, establishing stakeholder views of ‘a good life’ for pigs, a study trip to Ghana to explore barriers to sustainable goat production, an MRes student stipend to investigate environmental enrichment for dairy heifers)
• Two conferences/workshops hosted at Harper Adams – one on participatory engagement and one on providing a good life for pigs, plus an evening seminar with Prof Donald Broom. We also hosted a workshop at ISAE International conference in the Netherlands: Providing a good life to all animals: the importance of recognising, understanding and managing individual differences
• Members of our research group been invited to speak at All Ireland Welfare Forum, BSAS Early Careers Symposium, Dublin Zoo, Milking Goat Association AGM, The Scottish Consortium for Rural Research Early Careers Symposium, University of Nottingham
• 11 conferences attended (and some with staff presenting at) – we have been represented at the All Ireland Welfare Forum, American Dairy Science Association Annual Conference, Animal Welfare Research Network, British and Irish Association of Zoos and Aquariums Research Conference, British Society of Animal Science, BSAS Equine Conference, BSAVA Congress and Expo, Hannah Dairy Research Foundation Annual Conference, International Society for Applied Ethology Regional Meeting and International Congress and the National Equine Forum

• We’ve welcomed a huge range of visitors to share their expertise with staff and students alike. These have included:
  • Dr Craig Lewis from the Pig Improvement Company visited to talk about how industry initiatives are advancing animal health and welfare with a particular focus on integrating of genomic understanding alongside technology to assess behaviour and health parameters.
  • Dr Richard Lilley from Tracksys came to do a talk to our students on technology we can use for tracking animal behaviour, including The Observer XT
  • Dr Kat Hamill from Nottingham Trent University visited to share her expertise on animal spatial behaviour and radio tracking – which involved two hours running around the woods searching for radio collars!
  • Professor Lenny van Erp and Dr Gerben Hofstra visited us all the way from the Netherlands as part of our long-standing collaboration with HAS Green Academy. They shared recent research on precision livestock farming including insights from thermography and mapping the social interactions of dairy cattle
  • Natalie Emmerson from Sealife Birmingham came to talk about managing public aquaria, which formed part of our MOU with Sealife
  • Dr Robert Hyde from the University of Nottingham and VetVision AI gave a research seminar about ‘When algorithms observe: The use of computer vision AI in animal behaviour research’ which gave us all food for thought about how we could use AI for behavioural observations in our own work.
• And last but not least, we got some brand new kit!

As we are sure you know from our previous blog posts, we like to balance the fun with the work content, so we wanted to finish with some of our favourite Christmas facts* and jokes, here’s a selection from the group:

*One of these facts is dubious, we’ll let you figure out which!

• Santa’s reindeer (at least in the UK) were not all male as the stories would have you believe – they were in fact female. Both male and female reindeer shed their antlers but during the winter period only the female reindeer have their antlers. I guess this means that the reindeer in Australia were actually male though, it’s a long way to travel so perhaps the northern and southern hemisphere employ different reindeer to adhere to maximum working hours!
• In times of food scarcity reindeer will eat bird eggs and even chicks – animals are incredibly adaptable and being able to feed opportunistically as needed is extremely beneficial for survival
• Christmas is the time of year that the haggis increase their food intake ready for hibernation. Whilst not many people are lucky enough to see them you may see some glimpses whilst they are out on the Scottish hills at this time of year. Something you may not know, the haggis is the lesser-known cousin of the Eurasian beaver
• The robin is associated with Christmas because during the Victorian era the postmen used to wear red and were nicknamed ‘robins’ - but juvenile robins are mottled brown and don’t get their red breasts until they’re sexually mature
• Robins are one of few birds that sing all year round – they're fiercely territorial and the males and females even hold independent territories that they will defend against each other! Ever had a Robin appear whilst you’re gardening? That's because behaviourally they are one of the boldest foragers we have in our gardens in the UK.
• Red-nosed reindeer aren’t that rare (Sorry Rudolph!); the reindeer botfly (charmingly referred to as the ‘snotbot’) can cause red, inflamed noses in its unwitting host when the reindeer are trying to sneeze out the larvae that have hatched in their airways (Sorry everyone else!)
• What do you call a reindeer with bad manners? Rude-olph!

• Historically in Wales in the early hours of Christmas morning between 3am and 6am, a festive church service known as ‘Plygain’ was held. Plygain involved readings or a sermon followed by songs and carols sung by the congregation. As the service was so early in the morning, shepherds were some of the earliest to arrive, often bringing wool to decorate with or trade within the community. Typical farmers, trading even at 3am on Christmas day…
• You’re unlikely to find a partridge in a pear tree since they are ground nesting birds!
• What do reindeer say before telling a joke? This one will sleigh you!
• Why has Santa been banned from sooty chimneys? Carbon footprints!
• What sport are elves good at? North pole vaulting!
• Christmas pudding started life in the 14^th century as a thick broth type soup – it wasn’t until the Victorians came along and saved us from these horrors that the Christmas pudding we know and love came to fruition! It’s not safe for dogs though so keep these festive delights for human consumption only – raisins and sultanas are particularly bad because there is no specific toxic dose and a single raisin could cause liver failure – that’s before even considering the impacts of alcohol drenched puds and the work the dog’s pancreas will need to do to deal with the fat!

Disclaimer: the santa hat was added her using ChatGPT because Izzy is not a JRT who enjoys wearing additional clothing! She does however enjoy present wrapping!

• Who delivers presents to the nice baby sharks at Christmas? Santa jaws
• It may have been getting tricky to spot those famous two turtle doves due to dwindling numbers, but dedicated conservation efforts over recent years are seeing an encouraging recovery in the population. Don’t rush to your window just yet though; as migratory birds, you’ll only spot turtle doves in the UK during the summer months!
• What is a sheep’s favourite Christmas song? Fleece Navidad
• Who delivers presents to your dog and cat? Santa Paws
• What is a dog’s favourite Christmas song? Bark the herald angels sing

From us to you, we wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! We look forward to more adventures in 2026!