Are animals humanly killed, according to ethological and neurophysiological parameters?

European legislation about the slaughter of cattle aims to avoid useless suffering and pain to the animals, during the phase of stunning with a captive bolt pistol. The norm on stunning provides for the use of a stunning gun which is sometimes not adequate, in terms of size and cartridges, for the morphology of the frontal bone of the skull, especially in the case of breed heavy subjects. Therefore, sometimes the stunning does not lead to unconsciousness of the animal. In order to assess the effectiveness of the induced stunning in animals during the first phase of butchering, we have made an ethological and neurophysiological investigation about 227 killed animals in an authorized industrial CE slaughterhouse. The ethological and neurophysiological observations have been made through the compilation of a checklist. We studied sensory state (opisthotonos, emprosthotonos, blinking, kicking, exstensor hypertony, tail motor activity, tail tone muscle) and some behaviours pattern.