Aggression in replacement grower and finisher gilts fed a short-term high-tryptophan diet and the effect of long-term human–animal interaction

Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on January 16, 2009 | No Comments

Aggression can be a major problem for swine production as it negatively impacts the pigs’ health and welfare. Increasing tryptophan (TRP) intake to raise brain serotonin (5-HT)—key for aggression control, and long-term positive social handling can reduce stress in pigs. Objective was to feed a short-term high-TRP diet to grower (3 months) and finisher (6 months) maternal gilts that were either socially handled or not and measure their behavioural activity and aggressiveness. Eight pens of six unrelated gilts were split into two blocks balanced for litter, social handling (non- vs. handled) and dietary treatment (control vs. high-TRP). Social-handling was applied three times per week, from day 45 until 6 months of age. At 3 months, two handled and two non-handled pens were assigned to control while the other four pens were assigned to the high-TRP diet fed ad libitum for 7 days (days 1–7). At 6 months of age, pen assignment to dietary treatments was swapped. Body weights and blood were taken at days 1 (pre-feeding) and 7. Blood samples were analyzed for TRP and 5-HT concentrations using high pressure liquid chromatography. Behaviour was recorded from days 1 to 5 and scan-sampling used to determine time-budget behaviours and postures in a 12-h period each day (06:00–18:00 h). Aggression evaluation in the home pen focused on counts of agonistic interactions, bites and head-knocks per interaction during three, 30-min intervals (08:00, 12:00, and 16:00 h) from days 1 to 5. Resident–intruder (R–I) test was carried out for a maximum of 300 s at days 6 and 7 to measure aggressiveness, predicted by the latency to the first attack and attack outcomes. A 2 × 2 factorial arrangement of dietary treatment and social handling within age was analyzed by repeated measures of mixed models and Tukey adjustments. The TRP-added diet raised blood TRP concentration of 3- and 6-month-old gilts by 180.7% and 85.2% respectively (P < 0.05), reduced behavioural activity and time spent standing, while increasing lying behaviour, mostly in grower gilts (P < 0.05). High-TRP diet reduced the number of agonistic interactions, and aggressiveness in 3-month-old gilts, which took longer to attack the intruder pig, and displayed fewer attacks on the first day of testing (P < 0.05). Long-term positive social handling improved growth performance and had a slight effect on behaviour (P < 0.05). Provision of enhanced TRP diet reduced behavioural activity and aggressiveness of grower gilts, and these results are likely mediated by activation of brain serotonergic system. Short-term high-TRP dietary supplementation may be used to reduce aggression at mixing in young pigs.

For more information the full article can be found at http://journals.elsevierhealth.com/periodicals/applan/issues

Improving Production Efficiency in a Competitive Industry

Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Swine Innovation by admin on January 10, 2009 | No Comments

This paper takes an in-depth look at how to improve production efficiency in hog operations by improving sow management practices and genetic management. Three different areas are looked at and shown how improvements can increase production efficiency. The first area covered is sow and guilt management. Currently about half of sows are culled while only producing about 30-40 piglets in their life time, furthermore about 20% of sows are culled while not even giving birth. Better selection of gilts is one way to improve this, selecting gilts based on weight has proven to be a more effective strategy than based on age.  Improving guilt and sow management practices can have great benefits to an operations efficiency if attention is paid to all the small details. Some targets that should be the goal of any operation are: greater than 86% farrowing rates, greater than 12.5 total piglets born, greater than 70% of gilts served farrowing the 3rd litter, and 50 pigs weaned lifetime. The second topic focuses on the variability in grow-finish performance that can be linked back to birth weight. It is stated that growth rate after birth has already been pre-programmed before the pig is even born, this becomes most evident in the grow finish stage. Sorting pigs in the nursery and grow stage will not resolve variation in growth performance , it is still a characteristic of individual pigs and litters. The paper argues that recognizing and managing differences in birth weight and post natal growth between litters has the potential to cut costs in the immediate future. The third topic covered was the need to improve the genetic impact of elite sires. The overall production efficiency of the herd is dependent on the reproductive capacity of the boars used for mating, and the genetic merit of those boars. Because the pork industry will use one boar to breed hundreds of sows, if that boar has poor genetics it will impact thousands of pigs. Better management of genetic factors have the ability to improve overall production efficiency and help producers become more competitive.

BOARD-INVITED REVIEW: The use and application of distillers dried grains with solubles in swine diets

Posted in: Production by admin on January 1, 2009 | No Comments

Distillers dried grains with solubles (DDGS) may be included in diets fed to pigs in all phases of production. The concentrations of DE and ME in DDGS are similar to those in corn. This paper concludes that DDGS can be included in
diets fed to growing pigs in all phases of production, beginning at 2 to 3 wk postweaning, in concentrations of
up to 30% DDGS, and lactating and gestating sows can be fed diets containing up to 30 and 50%, respectively,
without negatively affecting pig performance.

For more information the full article can be found at http://jas.fass.org/

Rethinking the way we load pigs

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Powerpoint Presentation, presented at the 2009 Livestock Transportation Conference. Claims loading system results indicate that pigs loaded on the P chute during the FP have fewer total deads and total losses.

True digestibility of phosphorus in canola and soybean meals for growing pigs: Influence of microbial phytase

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The objectives of this study were to estimate the true digestibility of P (TPD) in canola (CM) and soybean meals (SM), and to determine the effect of microbial phytase on TPD, CM and SM. The results show a TPD of 41% in growing pigs fed CM or SM. This means that the addition of microbial phytase at 1,000 units/kg does improve the true digestibility of phosphorus in both canola and soybean meals.

For more information the full article can be found at http://jas.fass.org/

Chemical Hazards: A Swine Worker’s Guide

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Precautionary & Hazard Symbols, Point of Entry, Protective Gear, Solvents, Veterinary Drugs, Cleaners & Sanitizers, Insecticides, Rodenticides, Disposal and Emergency Numbers

Characterisation of sows’ postures and posture changes with regard to crushing piglets

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The aim of this study was to analyse different behavioural traits of sows to describe posture changes and to determine the influences of these traits on piglet losses. Twenty sows which crushed one or more than one piglet (C-sows) were compared to 20 sows which crushed no piglets (NC-sows). It is concluded that the results suggest posture patterns of non crushing-sows and Crushing-sows are different, especially nest-building behaviour prepartum and ventral or lateral recumbence postpartum, indicating a possible use to characterise the maternal abilities of sows in minimising piglet crushing.

Tissue fatty acid profiles, plasma biochemical characteristics and cecal biogenic amines in piglets fed diets containing flaxseed and carbohydrase enzymes

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Dietary manipulation has been proposed as a strategy for optimizing performance of newly weaned pigs. Flaxseed (FS) as a feed ingredient contains a number of constituents, such as mucilage, gel forming polysaccharides, structural carbohydrates and ω-3 fatty acids (FA), which could have functional properties in relation to optimizing piglet performance. The aim of this study was to determine tissue FA profiles, systemic and portal plasma biochemical characteristics and cecal digesta biogenic amines in piglets fed diets containing FS and a multi-carbohydrase enzyme supplement (C). It was found that FS with or without C supplementation supported lactate fermentors and reduced biogenic amine levels in the gastrointestinal tract suggesting potential of FS in promoting healthier gut in piglets. Enzyme supplementation increased plasma glucose independent of FS. Overall, the results provide further implications of applying dietary strategies to maintain health and productivity of piglets.

For more information the full article can be found at http://www.journals.elsevierhealth.com/periodicals/livsci

High-value manure

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Water is a valuable commodity on the dry plains of northwest
Oklahoma. So any opportunity to conserve and recycle this
precious resource is a real bonus to businesses like the farrow-to-wean hog operation owned by Chuck and Wathina Luthi. An important aspect to the Luthis’ manure management system
is how the manure is treated prior to flushing the pits, as well as
when it is situated in both stages of the lagoon. They treat the
manure with commercial pit additives, which are part of the overall
Hog Wash system. This system provides a number of benefits,
starting with reduced odor and hydrogen sulfide emissions.
Wathina says it is a natural carbon-based product that not only
improves the working environment in the barns, but also breaks down the manure solids. After eight years in operation, their farm
still has not had any issues with solid build-up in the lagoons, nor
have they had to invest in any mechanical systems to aerate them.

Global Price and Production Forecast

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Financial losses, due in large part to high feed prices, have caused both U.S.
and Canadian hog producers to reduce the number of litters they are
producing. This has led to an expected 2.5% decline in combined U.S. and
Canadian hog slaughter during 2009. Reduced hog slaughter should lift 2009
hog prices closer to breakeven levels. The biggest uncertainty is the impact
on meat demand of the developing global economic recession.