Centre for Animal Science

Improving farm animal welfare – what’s it worth?

Published on: 27 January 2021

Many livestock companies are aware that Australians have growing concerns over the welfare of animals. But it costs money to improve the welfare of farm animals – often a substantial investment by the business. There are many financial, practical, and ethical factors for businesses to consider when improving animal welfare, and the optimal course of action is not always obvious.

The sixth Animal Science poster Olympics 2021

Animal Science Olympics

Conference

Established in 2012 by Associate Professor Ala Lew-Tabor, the competition run by QAAFI's Centre for Animal Science.

In previous years the competition has attracted more than 26 participants, both research higher degree students and early career researchers in animal science from different UQ Schools and Institutes, CSIRO and the Qld Department of Agriculture & Fisheries.

The competitors present their research across many broad areas of animal science including koala healing, rumen microbiology and bovine genetics.

The sixth Animal Science poster Olympics 2021

19 February 2021 12:00pm–5:00pm

in Animal Science Olympics

The sixth Animal Science Olympics is on and we are welcoming poster submissions from all researchers in animal science. If you are not submitting a poster, come and support your peers.

QAAFI senior research fellow Geoffry Fordyce

Pain relief more common practice

Good animal welfare and animal husbandry procedures using pain relief have taken off massively in Queensland, according to Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation senior research fellow Geoffry Fordyce.

More frequently sheared sheep are happier mothers

Published on: 3 December 2020

More frequently sheared pregnant sheep are more active, have lower stress levels and produce lambs with finer wool, according to University of Queensland research.

Tracking stress remotely via wool cortisol and SMART tags: shearing early in pregnancy reduces stress and improves productivity of Merino sheep

15 December 2020 12:00pm–1:00pm

in Science Seminars

Dr Edward Narayan, Animal Scientist with QAAFI will present a seminar titled 'Tracking stress remotely via wool cortisol and SMART tags: shearing early in pregnancy reduces stress and improves productivity of Merino sheep'.

Buffalo fly faces Dengue nemesis

Published on: 30 October 2020

Few southern beef producers will have encountered the parasitic buffalo fly (Haematobia irritans exigua), a scourge of the northern cattle industry – but maintaining this state of affairs, and also lifting a burden off the northern industry, has become a race against time, and climate.

Combining genomic and metagenomic predictions increases accuracy

24 November 2020 12:00pm–1:00pm

in Science Seminars

Dr Elizabeth Ross is a research fellow with the Centre for Animal Science at QAAFI. Dr Ross will present a science seminar 'Genomic predictions using data from the sheep microbiome', based on a recently published article in the Journal of Animal Science.

Blueprint to more productive cattle herds

Published on: 30 September 2020

Profitability is linked to fertility of cows for northern beef enterprises and can be substantially improved with new breeding methods based on cutting-edge genome technology. The use of genome data is beginning to drive up the fertility of Australia’s northern cattle herds. Differences in fertility can mean up to three extra calves over a cow’s lifetime, so potential gains are large.

Bull power for performance, production and profit of Australian beef herds

Article by Dr Geoffry Fordyce published 27 August 2020 by FutureBeef regarding bull management in northern beef herds.