Questions relatives aux eaux de surface

Posted in: Environment by admin on January 1, 2006 | No Comments

Les eaux de surface – lacs, rivières, ruisseaux et autres milieux humides – couvrent près de 20 % du territoire provincial et sont un élément essentiel de notre identité et de notre patrimoine manitobains. La protection de ces ressources est importante pour tous.

Focus on the Future Conference 2006

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Pork Interpretive Gallery Announces Change of Operations

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Saskatoon, SK., September 22, 2006: Dr. John Patience, President of the Prairie Swine Centre, and Neil Ketilson, General Manager, Saskatchewan Pork Development Board (Sask Pork) wish to announce the transfer of management of the Pork Interpretive Gallery (P.I.G.) to Sask Pork.

As part of the development of the PSC Elstow Research Farm, a subsidiary of Prairie Swine Centre (PSC), the industry requested the barn provide a way for the general public to view modern pork production from a vantage point inside a barn. To this end a novel “gallery” approach was built into the barn design. John Patience sums up the industry reaction, “Throughout the two years of development and fundraising, and the most recent three years of operating the Pork Interpretive Gallery (P.I.G.), I have never been involved with a project which achieved and sustained so much grass roots support. Pork producers speak of this project with great pride and admiration, matched only by the enthusiastic comments we continually receive from people who have toured the facility.”

With financial and in-kind support from the pork industry, PSC has successfully operated the P.I.G. for the past three years. The gallery is a unique public communications vehicle and will now be an in-house project for Sask Pork. This will allow PSC to focus on its primary mandate of providing a Centre of Excellence in applied swine production research. “By transferring daily operating responsibilities for the P.I.G. to Sask Pork personnel there is a more appropriate link between organization mandate and the activities the organizations are involved with” notes Dr. Patience.

“The public’s perception of the pork industry is fundamental to the growth and development of the pork sector in this province” notes Neil Ketilson. “The Gallery complements Sask Pork’s communications and agri-education programs. To support the project, we have added a new staff member, Jessica Podhordeski, who joins the organization as Agri-Education Coordinator. Her role will include the management and promotion of the Pork Interpretive Gallery to schools, international visitors and the public.

The link between Prairie Swine Centre and the pork industry has always been important for both organizations and this change only further strengthens that relationship.

To book a tour call 1-866-PIG-TOUR (744-8687)., or visit www.porkinterpretivegallery.ca.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION
Located in PSC Elstow Research Farm, a 600-sow commercial farrow-to-finish barn, the redesigned attic space provides a professional, welcoming gallery with windows to view the pigs below. In addition, the facility uses a science-centre approach in providing guided tours, informative signage and interactive displays for visitors to learn the science and practice of modern pork production first hand in what has become known as a ‘living classroom’. To date the Pork Interpretive Gallery has hosted over 4,500 people, half of which are school-aged children and teachers. In addition to school groups the P.I.G. has hosted numerous international visitors, local government, pork producers and general public tours.

Prairie Swine Centre Inc., located near Saskatoon, is a non-profit research corporation affiliated with the University of Saskatchewan, and is recognized globally for its contributions to practical, applied science in pork production in the disciplines of Nutrition, Engineering and Animal Behaviour.

Saskatchewan Pork Development Board was established in April 1998, Sask Pork is a non-profit development board funded by a provincial hog check-off. The organization works on behalf of pork producers to ensure continued environmental, social and economic sustainability for the pork industry.

Key areas of activity include:
· Producer services including delivery of the Canadian Quality Assurance (CQA®) On-Farm Food Safety Program, Animal Care Assessment (ACA), and the Trucker Quality Assurance (TQA®) animal transport program.
· Funding of swine research accounts for nearly 30% Sask Pork’s annual total budget. Projects funded include those that focus on animal and human health, environmental, manure management, production issues, and pork quality.
· Industry development and sustainable production
· Product promotion including consumer and retail programs
· Provincial and national on-farm and off-farm policy development
· Communications and community relations
· Agri-Education and management of Pork Interpretive Gallery (P.I.G.) at Elstow, Saskatchewan
· Partnership Programming including the annual, international Pork Industry Symposium coordinated jointly by Sask Pork and the Livestock Development Branch of Saskatchewan Agriculture and Food.

The Development of Belly Nosing, Belly Sucking and Tail Biting in Early Weaned Pigs

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Summary

Observations were made on the incidence of belly nosing, belly sucking, tail biting and other oral-nasal behaviours of pigs weaned at 14 days-of-age, at intervals up to the finishing stage. Belly nosing peaked approximately 2 weeks after weaning at 5% of the time, while belly sucking remained at less than 1% of the time throughout the animal’s life. Tail biting only occurred in the finishing phase and occurred at approximately 0.5% of the time. Although the peak incidence of belly nosing by a pig was correlated with belly sucking, tail biting was only weakly related with any of the other behaviours.

Introduction

Early weaning of piglets, at less than 3 weeks of age, was widely adopted by the industry in the late 90’s. Although the practice has some distinct advantages, it is also recognized that it results in some problems and management must be very good. One of the problems associated with early weaning is a higher incidence of behavioural vices, such as belly directed behaviour. Close observation of pigs performing belly directed behaviour indicates that it exists in two forms, belly nosing and belly sucking. The objective of this study was to investigate the incidence and frequency of belly nosing and belly sucking behaviour in early-weaned pigs and how these relate to other oral-nasal behaviour of pigs, including tail biting, in the grow-finish stage.

Experimental Procedures

We studied 242 piglets, from 24 litters weaned at 14 days-of-age and observed belly nosing, belly sucking, other nosing (to other parts of the body) other sucking, and biting behaviours at 18, 23, 28, 50, 63 and 91 days-of-age. We used instantaneous scan sampling (observations at 5-min intervals) to determine the amount of time spent in each behaviour, and continuous observations (for 4 hours on days 21 and 35) to determine the frequency and bout lengths of each behaviour. Pigs were individually identified with paint and ear tags prior to observations in the nursery and finishing pens, respectively.

Results and Discussion

Belly nosing was found to begin within 4 days of weaning, peak at 23-28 days of age, and gradually decrease with age thereafter (Table 1). At its peak, pigs spent an average of 5% of their time, or 70 min/day belly nosing. Belly sucking increased with age throughout the nursery and reached a peak in the grow-finish phase. Pigs in the finishing phase spent approximately 1% of their time belly sucking, or about 14 min/day. The length of belly nosing and sucking bouts increased with age, ranging from 17 to 27 sec/bout for belly nosing, and 23 to 58 sec/bout for belly sucking. Other nosing remained fairly consistent at 2-4% of the time at different ages, as did other biting at 1-2% of the time. Other sucking was low until late in the finishing phase when it reached 4% of the time. Tail biting, recognized as a damaging behaviour, did not appear until the grow-finish phase and only reached 0.5% of the time, or an average of 3-4 min/day.

Our previous research indicated that there is considerable variation among piglets in how much belly nosing they perform, with some exceeding 10% of their total time. In this study we determined by correlation analysis that piglets that performed the greatest amount of belly nosing during the peak of this behaviour at 28 days-of-age were more likely to belly nose and belly suck other pigs in grow-finish. In general, tail biting was only weakly correlated with nosing and sucking behaviours in the nursery.

Conclusions

Belly nosing and tail biting peak at two distinctly different stages in a pig’s life, early nursery and finishing, respectively. A poor association between the two vices indicates that they probably originate from two different motivational systems. Other oral behaviours, such as nosing, sucking and biting directed at different parts of the body are relatively stable throughout the pig’s life to 91 days-of-age. Different management tools will be needed to control belly nosing and tail biting, as their causative motivations appear to be specific and distinct from each other.

Acknowledgements

Strategic program funding was provided by Sask Pork, Alberta Pork, Manitoba Pork, and the Saskatchewan Agriculture Development Fund.

“Different management tools will be needed to control belly nosing and tail biting, as their causative motivations appear to be specific and distinct from each other.”

Les effets de 5 ppm de Ractopamine dans les rations des porcs sur la performance de croissance et la qualité de carcasse.

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Le Paylean (un produit d’Elanco) est un additif alimentaire qui contient un ingrédient actif appelé ractopamine. Cet ingrédient augmente la croissance des muscles et diminue le dépôt de gras. Cette étude vise à déterminer exactement à quel point le Paylean améliore la performance. Il a été observé que les porcs traités avec le Paylean avaient un gain moyen quotidien de 13% de plus que les porcs qui n’ont pas été traités avec le Paylean. Comme les porcs traités avec la ractopamine n’ont consommé plus de moulée que ceux qui n’ont pas été traité, il a été conclu que les porcs traités ont subi une augmentation de 13% de leur conversion de alimentaire. Par conséquent, les porcs traités ont nécessité 11,3 kg de moins de moulée pour atteindre le poids d’abattage que ceux sans le traitement. Une diminution des effets a commencé au 28e jour du traitement, et les deux sexes ont répondu de façon similaire.

A Proactive Approach to Animal Welfare

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It is apparent that some very fundamental changes are taking place in Canada with how the industry approaches issues related to animal care. The first change is the extensive process of animal welfare audits that occurs at slaughter facilities (brought about by Wendy’s, Burger King, and McDonalds). This audit system is based on observable outcomes such as squeals, slips, falls, and blinking. From a processors perspective, audits have a number of purposes. These include the ensuring that standards are maintained or improved in some orderly manner, and that inadequate performance can be documented and corrected by a supplier. Most Canadian facilities easily met the standards and passed audits conducted by the food service firms. Some issues existed though, such as the use of electrical prods. Many facilities have made use of animal handling training programs in order to meet regulations. Audit results are often used as the basis for changes to procedures and facilities. Codes of Practice are a perfectly acceptable alternative in terms of how an industry can choose to set standards by which it operates. However, standards without external monitoring processes, verification, or audit are not credible.

Antimicrobial activity of essential oils and structurally related synthetic food additives towards selected pathogenic and beneficial gut bacteria

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Effects of species-relevant environmental enrichment on the behaviour and productivity of finishing pigs

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There is a large body of literature supporting the hypothesis that environmental enrichment improves animal welfare. One of the main mechanisms by which enrichment improves animal welfare is the creation of behavioural opportunities to allow an animal to express control over its environment. Straw is generally regarded as a functional form of enrichment for pigs (Arey, 1993), as it occupies pigs for up to 25% of their active time (McKinnon et al., 1989; Beattie et al., 2000). It provides thermal and physical comfort, it can be ingested to provide gutfill, and it provides a substrate for chewing and rooting activities (Fraser, 1975). In situations where a substrate cannot be provided enrichment objects should be offered instead (Defra Code of Recommendations for the Welfare of Livestock: Pigs, 2003). However, if an enrichment object is offered as an alternative to straw it should occupy animals to the same extent and divert them from performing adverse behaviour. In a previous study by Van de Weerd et al. (2003) the characteristics of objects that were found to maintain a pig’s attention were ingestible, destructible, deformable, chewable and odorous, and these were in many cases associated with rootable substrates. However, other characteristics suggested by the analysis as important were ‘not rootable’ and ‘not particulate’, which although initially counterintuitive, related to hanging, ingestible objects, which proved very effective in maintaining a pig’s interest. In the present study, three different enrichment objects, which were designed according to the pig-specific requirements, were provided to groups of growing pigs with undocked tails. The enrichment treatments were a substrate dispenser providing straw, a rootable feed dispenser providing flavoured feed and a liquid dispenser that provided flavoured water when chewable rods were manipulated. These objects were compared with a pen with a full bed of straw (positive control) and a commercial enrichment object, a Bite Rite (Ikadan System, Denmark, minimal enrichment). Video tape recordings from weeks 1, 3 and 7 were scanned using time sampling to investigate general behaviour and enrichment use. Production parameters were measured, as well as occasions where tail biting (with fresh damage to a tail) occurred. The behavioural observations revealed that the pigs used all of the enrichment provided, but there were differences in the level and type of enrichment use by the pigs. The extent to which the straw and straw rack were used was significantly greater than for the other treatments (11.5 and 3.6% of the observations). Enrichment that was located on the floor could be manipulated from different postures, including whilst lying down; for example in 6.6% of the observations in which pigs on straw were lying down, they were manipulating the straw. This also applied, but to a lesser extent, to the straw rack and rootable feed dispenser. Groups provided with the liquid dispenser (which experienced technical problems) and Bite Rite had the highest prevalence of tail biting incidents (100 and 83% of pens, respectively). This study shows that a full bed of straw was the most successful way of occupying the pigs and, in addition, it prevented severe tail biting. Where it is not possible to supply a full bed of straw, point source enrichment objects such as substrate or feed dispensers appear to offer a good substitute. Such objects were well used and did not affect production negatively; furthermore, severe outbreaks of tail biting were prevented.

Programming the offspring of the pig by prenatal social stress: Neuroendocrine activity and behaviour

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Microbial source tracking using host specific FAME profiles of fecal coliforms

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The objective of this study was to investigate the host-specific differences in fatty acid
methyl ester (FAME) profiles of fecal coliforms (FC). A known-source library was
constructed with 314 FC isolates cultured from 6 possible sources of fecal pollution; 99
isolates from sewage; 29 from bovine; 29 from poultry; 50 from swine; 46 from waterfowl;
and 61 from deer. It was found that the hydroxy FAMEs 12:0 2OH, 12:0 3OH, and 14:0 2OH
were exclusively associated with isolates of human origin. On the other hand, 3 saturated
FAMEs, 10:0, 15:0, and 18:0 were found only in isolates from non-human sources, 15:0 being
associated with livestock samples only. In addition to the presence of these signature
FAMEs, the mean relative masses of 16:1 o7c and 16:1 ISO/14:0 3OH were significantly
different between the isolates of human and non-human origins. A linear discriminant
function differentiated FC isolates of human origin from those of livestock and wildlife
origin at 99% accuracy. These results strongly suggest that the FAME profiles of FC show
statistically significant host specificity and may have the potential to be used as a
phenotypic microbial source tracking tool.