Resting pattern and social interactions in goats-The impact of size and organisation of lying space

The goats spent less time resting (P < 0.01) and rested less simultaneously (P < 0.001) when the resting area was small compared to a medium and large resting area. Time spent resting in the activity area also increased with decreasing lying space (P < 0.01). The goats preferred resting close to a pen wall, and this occurred more seldom when the resting area was small (P < 0.01). Resting in social contact with pen-mates occurred in less than 6% of the observations lying, and this was not significantly affected by the size of the resting area. When the lying space was organized on two levels, one or two goats resting at the same time on the same level was most commonly observed. In most pens, the lowest ranked individuals in the groups spent less time resting (P < 0.01), less time resting against a wall (P < 0.01), and spent more of their resting time in the low-comfort activity area (P < 0.0001). The amount of social interactions was not significantly affected by the size of the resting area, but there were significantly fewer displacements (P < 0.01) and the overall aggression level was lower (P < 0.05) when lying space was organised on two levels rather than one. In conclusion, time spent resting and resting pattern was more dependent on size (large, medium, small) than organisation (one versus two levels) of the lying space, whereas this was the opposite for social interactions.