**1. Introduction**

In everyday life, the feeding of cattle is usually judged from an economic point of view: A feed fulfils its purpose if it supplies the animal in such a way that it achieves its performance and is also as cost-effective as possible. In the process, animal welfare is sometimes overlooked, although this in turn has an influence on performance, useful life and thus also on the economic viability of cattle farming.

Since the 1970s, the performance of dairy cows has increased by more than 35%. At the same time, however, the age of life decreased significantly [1]. Thus, about 30% of dairy cows already drop out in the first lactation. This is mainly caused by udder diseases (around 30% of mergers), but hoof and joint diseases as well as metabolic disorders (around 10% each) are also cited as causes [2]. There is no doubt that several factors are responsible for these developments and must be taken into account and optimised accordingly. However, the question arises as to the importance of feeding in this context. According to the Animal Welfare Act (§ 2), anyone who keeps, looks after or has to look after an animal must feed, care for and house the animal in a manner appropriate to its species and needs.

Here, the interlink between feeding and husbandry becomes clear. In order to ensure sufficient feed intake, the housing conditions must first be designed in such a way that the animal is able to carry out its physiological behaviour with regard to food and water intake as well as chewing behaviour. The design of housing follows the concept of the "five freedoms", which requires freedom from (1) hunger and thirst, (2) discomfort, (3) pain, injury and disease, (4) fear and stress, and (5)

the exercise of normal behaviour. The importance of this behavioural concept for the general performance of animals is underpinned by studies carried out within the AgroClustEr PHÄNOMICS at the University of Rostock and the Leibniz Institute for Farm Animal Biology. It was shown that different temperament types differ not only in their behaviour, but also in their metabolism [3]. Taking into account the species-specific (preferably temperament-specific) requirements helps to make optimal use of existing metabolic pathways.

In order to enable the animal to ingest sufficient quantities of feedstuff, there should be (except in the case of stations in which concentrated feed is offered) an animal to feeding place ratio of 1: 1 (control report 2015 for Lower Saxony and Bremen in accordance with Article 41 of EU Regulation No. 809/2014 for the onthe-spot controls on cross compliance [4, 5]). The feed offered must meet clear legal requirements. According to § 3 of the Animal Welfare Act, it is forbidden to offer feed that causes the animal considerable pain, suffering or damage. This certainly refers to contamination such as foreign bodies (stones, wire, etc.) or poisonous plants, but also to the hygiene status of a feed (e.g. yeast content, contamination with mycotoxins), which can have considerable consequences for the animal's well-being (e.g. tympania in younger cattle after ingestion of heavily contaminated silage). In addition, the ration design itself is also important, which will be discussed in the following chapters. Imbalances in the crude fibre and starch content of the feed, lack of synchronicity in the rumen, energy or mineral deficiencies as well as the use of less palatable feeds are examples to be mentioned here. Finally, the feeding technique is also important, which varies considerably in some cases and affects the quality of the cow's supply and thus their well-being.
