Resting behaviour of cattle in a slaughterhouse lairage

One-hundred and thirty-five groups of cattle were observed in a slaughterhouse lairage. Groups of cattle that arrived direct from farms took longer to lie down and spent less time lying down than those that arrived from markets. In 72 groups, the majority of time was spent with no animals in the group lying down. In only 42 groups was the majority of the time spent with greater than one-half of the group lying down. In 97 groups, over three-quarters of the time in the lairage was spent with no cattle in the group moving. The proportion of time that cattle spent moving and lying down was also affected by the sexual composition of the group and also by group size. In cattle direct from farms, moving behaviour was greater in groups containing cattle with horns than in similar groups that did not contain cattle with horns.