Assessment of human-animal relationship in cattle kept on slatted floor

The nature of human contacts toward cattle can affect their subsequent behavioural response. The aim of this study was to evaluate the test-retest reliability of some variables used to assess the quality of human–animal relationship. These variables were: time needed to isolate a subject from the group in a corner of the pen (TI), isolation time (IT) and number of flight attempts (FA). They were recorded in 1 farm on 30 Italian Freisian males aged 10 months. Observations were conducted in the home pens by two trained people: one always recording the variables (observer), the other always performing the test (handler). Three recordings were performed at 15 day intervals. Reliability was tested using the Kendall’s W coefficient. The three observations were significantly similar (P<0.05, P<0.001 and P<0.01 for TI, IT and FA, respectively), although the W coefficient was high for IT (0.81) but lower for TI (0.50) and FA (0.67). In addition, the Spearman coefficient showed a significant correlation between IT and FA (rs=-0.40, P<0.05). These results indicate that the time of isolation may be a reliable indicator of the animal responsiveness to the stockperson.