Both adaptation and failure to adjust have come to be recognizable in the behaviour of animals. Detailed knowledge of the behaviour of livestock under various husbandry systems is therefore needed to assess management options. The behavioural approach can be used successfully as a basis for determining the wellbeing of animals in their husbandry. Contemporary animal husbandry needs to apply such an approach so that it can meet its obligation to appraise welfare. Knowledge of the behaviour of animals needs to be applied to all forms of animal use in the interests of their comprehensive health and welfare.
Ethology is the scientific study of the behaviour of animals in their natural environments.
Animal behaviour is the overt and composite functioning of animals both individually and collectively. Behaviour is also the means whereby the animal interacts with its environment, both animate and inanimate. This study is therefore highly relevant to veterinary medicine and to animal use. Animal users are showing new and serious interest in the whole subject of animal behaviour and the scientific study of the behaviour of the domesticated animals is now a specified discipline in the curricula of increasing numbers of academic institutions. Applied ethology welds many of the established undergraduate subjects together and is closely allied with the disciplines of animal science, veterinary medicine and animal husbandry.