The period before slaughter - lairage time in the abattoir - is a significant welfare event for cattle. Proper lairage management reduces fear, injury, and stress, improving both welfare and meat quality.
Lairage management is one of those welfare areas where animal welfare and meat quality interests genuinely align: cattle that are calmer and less stressed at slaughter produce better quality meat. This convergence should make lairage welfare improvements easier to achieve commercially than many other welfare measures. The critical factors are rest time, social group integrity, and basic comfort - food, water, appropriate housing. Handling in lairage also matters enormously: cattle moved calmly using behavioral principles, without electric goads or shouting, arrive at the stunning point in better welfare condition than cattle moved with aversive methods. Temples Grandin's work on low-stress handling in abattoirs has demonstrated that these improvements are practical and commercially beneficial.