For over 70 years, HorseWorld has been involved in providing the best possible welfare for a range of rescued horses, donkeys and mules. Over the years we have improved our approach, followed best practices and invested in training our team to recognise good health and welfare. Our approach is to use the five domains of welfare, as defined by Professor David Mellor. This is a science based structure for assessing animal welfare, which recognises that animals can experience feelings ranging from negative to positive. The model is divided into four functional domains: nutrition, environment, health and behaviour, which provide the requirements and experience for animal well-being. The fifth domain is the mental domain, which is the output of the four functional domains and reflects the animal’s overall welfare status.
The diagrams below illustrate the domains of welfare:
