Using a Delphi consultation study to develop a welfare assessment for little penguins Eudyptula spp. in managed care

To ensure social licence and optimise animals’ quality of life, zoological institutions have been under increased pressure to routinely assess the welfare of the animals in their care. Regular, evidence based, and objective assessment is required to monitor how zoo animals are coping or thriving physiologically and psychologically in their managed environment. Species-specific assessment tools are lacking for data deficient, behaviourally inexpressive or little-known species, such as the little penguin Eudyptula spp. despite their popularity in zoos worldwide. This study aimed to use a modified Delphi methodology to achieve expert consensus on potential welfare measures for little penguins. The initial list was derived from the literature and based on the Five Domains model. This was followed by two rounds of online surveys, completed by 36 international welfare scientists, veterinary professionals, penguin researchers and caretakers. In the first round, experts were asked to rate 59 potential criteria on a 5-point Likert scale for validity and practicality. Of these measures, 44 achieved >70% consensus for being both valid and practical to measure. In the second survey, experts were asked to rank the resynthesised list from (1) most valid to (44) least valid and were asked to infer how often each criterion should ideally be measured. The experts achieved a strong level of agreement after round 2 (W = 0.72404, p < 0.01). Experts identified 28 resource-based and 16 animal-based measures that were considered valid and practical to assess little penguin welfare in managed care. The final criteria included health, behavioural, environmental and nutritional measures, representing the four functional domains from the five domains model of animal welfare. The resulting ranked criteria could be further validated in a practical setting, providing an essential first step in creating a species-specific assessment tool to measure little penguin welfare in managed care.