Assessing animal welfare collaboratively, reliably, and efficiently
Scottish wildcat (photo credit RZSS)
What do we provide
The University of Stirling and the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland have collaborated to create two resources:
The Standardised Welfare Assessment Tool (SWAT)
The Behaviour and Environment Evidence Base (BEEB)
The SWAT and BEEB were created to address the concerns and difficulties in conducting thorough and reliable animal welfare assessments. Together, these resources provide a full, standardised, and validated welfare assessment program along with tools for collecting and analysing behavioural data.
Flexible use
The SWAT and BEEB are flexible in their use, giving institutions the ability to choose the elements that fit into their existing welfare or research programs, or providing a ready-to-implement welfare assessment program.
Evidence-based made easy(er)
With tools to collect, visualise, and interpret welfare and behavioural data, the SWAT and BEEB make it easier to take an evidence-based approach to improving the welfare of your species.
A way to compare apples to oranges
With a standardised welfare assessment for all species and ethograms for all taxon groups, zoos can compare welfare outcomes across species or across institutions to gain deeper insights into the needs of their animals.
A collaborative space
This site is also a space to build a species-specific ethogram library collaboratively with the animal community.