The stress level of the animal upon arrival at a harvesting facility drastically affects the quality of the meat obtained from the animal. Meat from highly stressed cattle tends to be dark and tough, whereas cattle that are less stressed produce a much more desirable and tender product.6 Reducing stress associated with transportation results in healthier animals, higher-quality beef products, and decreased food waste, all of which reduces the environmental impact per unit of beef.3
Lameness, or the abnormal gait or stance of an animal that can cause difficulty in its movement, is another animal health and welfare issue that can affect environmental impacts per unit of beef. Peer-reviewed research on lameness and the mobility of beef cattle is lacking in comparison to other species, such as dairy cattle, broiler chickens, and swine. This is likely due to an overall lower
incidence of lameness for beef cattle in comparison to those aforementioned species. However, research in those other species consistently shows negative effects on the productivity of animals as a result of lameness, such as decreased growth rates and poorer reproductive performance.3 Consequently, it is appropriate to conclude that lame beef cattle will also have impaired productivity, such as decreased growth rates due to an unwillingness to visit a feed bunk as frequently as cattle that are not lame. As with previous examples, decreased productivity of an individual animal can cause the increased use of natural resources to produce a unit of beef and, therefore, higher environmental impacts per unit of beef. For both the welfare of their animals and the environment, beef producers practice management techniques to limit the incidence of lameness, such as decreasing the frequency of animal handling, ensuring pens are free of excess moisture and selecting structurally correct breeding animals.
Some stressors that cattle experience, such as weather extremes, are unavoidable. Thermal stressors affect cattle health, productivity, growth, and reproductive performance even long after the weather event occurs.3,5 Mitigating the effects of weather extremes is not always feasible, particularly because cattle spend the majority of their lives outdoors. However, some management
interventions can improve both animal comfort and productivity, which has a positive impact on the
environment. Providing shade or sprinklers in the summertime and shelters or wind breaks in the wintertime can reduce thermal stresses. Reducing thermal stressors improves feed-to-gain ratios, reproductive success, and final carcass weight, thereby simultaneously improving animal welfare and lowering environmental impacts per unit of beef.3,5
While eliminating all stressful events from beef production is unrealistic in the same way that we do not live our lives completely without stress, management techniques and genetic selection can be used to reduce cattle stress, resulting in simultaneous improvements of animal health and welfare. Animal health and welfare go hand-in-hand with reducing environmental impact and maintaining economic viability.