Objective
Deer farming is a relatively new agricultural enterprise. Basic information about breeding, feeding and management has been collected through research projects within the EC and in New Zealand.
Deer are highly seasonal animals, always calving in early summer. Deer farm management follows the same seasonality. Up until now, animals have been finished for slaughter in July-December, at 1418 month of age. It means that the market is only supplied with fresh venison for a very short period of time. It is assumed that if deer farming is to develop further and reach significant production levels, strategies for the production and supply of fresh venison on a year round basis needs to be developed. The present project aims at developing such systems, focusing on young animals for slaughter.
For deer farming to develop and reach significant production levels strategies for the production and supply of fresh venison on a year round basis needs to be developed. These strategies include different housing, weaning and feeding systems. Red and fallow dear were weaned and housed under different lighting regimes and housing systems and fed different rations to obtain either different slaughter weights or the same slaughter weight, but at different ages. Red deer calves were weaned, housed and exposed to different strategies of housing, grazing or a combination of housing and grazing for 3 week periods and red and fallow deer calves wee weaned and housed at different pen areas per calf. Red and fallow deer calves were weaned, housed and fed different rations over winter to obtain different growth rates. Preliminary results indicate different responses to the induced treatments but it is too early to draw any conclusions, as data collection and analysis are not complete.
Different housing and feeding systems will be investigated, and the produced carcases will undergo detailed analysis, including taste panel tests. This topic will be investigated in Action 1 in the project.
The need to house deer calves over winter in most of Europe, calls for special attention in the field of welfare under such conditions. Different weaning and housing systems, including different combinations of weaning-housing-grazing, indoor stocking rates and group sizes, will be investigated. Behavioural as well as physiological parameters will be measured. This topic will be investigated in Action 2 in the project.
The female deer has a very long reproductive life of about 15 years. It is thus very important for the biological and economical output of the deer production system, that she is raised under conditions that will allow her to express her full production potential as a breeding female. The effect of different growth patterns from weaning until puberty at 16 month upon later performance, namely weaning percentage and calf weaning weight, will be investigated in Action 3 in the project.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
This project has not yet been classified with EuroSciVoc.
Be the first one to suggest relevant scientific fields and help us improve our classification service
You need to log in or register to use this function
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Data not available
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Data not available
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Data not available
Coordinator
8830 TJELE
Denmark
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.