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Prairie Swine Centre is an affiliate of the University of Saskatchewan
Prairie Swine Centre is grateful for the assistance of the George Morris Centre in developing the economics portion of Pork Insight.
Financial support for the Enterprise Model Project and Pork Insight has been provided by:
Duration of cold stress modulates overall immunity of chicken lines divergently selected for antibody response
Posted in: Welfare by admin on January 1, 2004 | No Comments
The effect that the duration of cold stress in reference to how long after the chickens were immunized was studied in three lines of chickens. Two of the lines were bred for either high or low antibody responses and the control was a random-breed line. The chicks were restricted fed at 80% of ad libitum intake levels. Chicks that were 26 days old were exposed to 10ºC temperatures for 0, 2 or 7 days. The chicks were immunized with keyhole limpet homocyanin (KLH) –1, +1, +3, +5 or +7 days following the cold stress. The cellular immunity of the chicks was measured by in vitro lymphocyte proliferation in response to concanavalin A (conA) and KLH. Phagocytosis was measured also measured. The exposure to cold stress negatively affected the body weight gain of the chickens. Exposure to cold stress for seven days significantly enhanced cellular immunity to conA. However, exposure to cold stress for two days had a varying effect on the lymphocyte proliferation in response to conA and was dependent on the chickens’ genetics and the timing of the immunization. The lymphocyte proliferation in response to KLH was enhanced in hens that underwent two days of cold stress 28 days after they were immunized. Cold stress did not affect the antibody response to KLH, but it delayed the mitogen response to conA. The high antibody line of chickens had a higher response to KLH than the other lines. The lymphocyte response to conA was lower in chickens bred to have lower antibody responses. The response of the immune system (phagocytosis) to cold stress was immediate. However, this response was quite variable and the response was not affected by whether they were chickens bred to have high or low antibody responses. When the chickens underwent cold stress for a longer amount of time, the cellular adaptive response, and the humoral immune response were affected to a small degree. There was not an interaction between genetic lines and treatments, which suggests that the genetics that affected the degree of the specific immune response. Overall, when a chicken is feed-restricted and undergoes stress at the same time, their cellular immunity is more sensitive than their humoral immunity. As well, the negative correlation between body weight gains and cellular immunity implies that by enhancing one trait results in the impairment of the other.
Accompanying pre-weaned Thoroughbred foals while separated from the mare during covering reduces behavioural signs of distress exhibited
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During breeding (covering) on some Thoroughbred farms the mare id taken from the box stall in which it is kept with its foal to be serviced by the stallion. The foal is left behind in the stall and often behaves in a manner that would indicate stress and that could result in injury. In this study involving 57 foals, approximately half were accompanied by a handler in their box stall while the mare was absent. The handler stood in the stall and only interacted with the foal if it approached and initiated contact. The non-accompanied foals were left alone in their stalls and observed from outside. Accompanied foals vocalized less and spent less time pawing than did the nonaccompanied foals. Approximately half of the nonaccompanied foals also hurled themselves against the stall wall while non of the accompanied foals did so. The presence of a human in the pen during the mare’s absence reduced the stressfulness of the situation and potentially harmful behaviour.
End-of-cycle bone quality in white and brown-egg laying hens.
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Depletion of bone calcium during the laying cycle results in weakened bones at end-of-lay. The danger of bone breakage in the cage or during handling at disposal is a welfare problem. In this study two strains of hens, one brown (Shaver 579) and one white-egg (Shaver 2000), were studied at the end of lay. The white-egg strain had produced more eggs during the cycle than the brown-egg strain, but the brown-egg strain produced larger eggs with more shell material. The brown-egg strain was slightly heavier at the end-of-lay as well. Bone density of the femur did not differ between strains, but all measures for the humerus and all remaining measures for the femur indicated that the bones of the brown-egg strain were stronger at the end-of-lay. Bone breaking strengths were approximately 20% greater for the brown-egg line. Of the two lines tested, the brown-egg line had better bone quality at the end-of-lay and would be less susceptible to breakage and poor welfare. However, it should be recognized that only one line of each egg type was studied and it cannot be determined if these differences are due to egg-type or unique to the strains studied.
Previous handling and gentle interactions affect behaviour and heart rate of dairy cows during a veterinary procedure.
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Animals often display behavioural and physiological stress responses during routine veterinary and management procedures. These responses can be dangerous to the animals and humans and might lower welfare and performance. The effects of previous positive handling and of gentle interactions during rectal palpation and a sham insemination on the behaviour and heart rate of dairy cows were investigated. Two groups of 10 cows each were studied. One group received positive handling for four weeks in addition to routine handling by one handler. The second group only received routine handling by different caretakers. Following the handling period, each cow received a rectal palpation on four days under four different situations: cow is alone, with the handler, with a usual caretaker, or with an unknown person. Lower heart rates, less kicking, and the tendency for less restless behaviour were found among cows that had experienced the positive handling. Gentle interactions during the test also calmed the cows. However, the person involved in the gentle interactions caused different reactions. Gentling by the handler resulted in less restless behaviour, compared to gentling by the other two people. The authors concluded that previous positive handling and gentle interactions by the positive handler during stressful procedures, causes a reduction in stress reactions. The person involved in interactions makes a difference in the calming effect on the animals. These results show the importance of positive interactions with animals, as they improve welfare and decrease the risk of dangerous responses by the animals during stressful procedures.
Driving Costs Out of the Production System
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As recent history of the U.S. swine industry has evidenced, survival in today’s uncertain economic times depends upon a pig production business having either (1) marketing agreements that provide complete price protection against prolonged declines in both carcass and meat prices or (2) competitively low costs of production along with a marketing agreement that at least dampens declines in market prices. These proceedings offer one view on how cost management can be addressed in a contemporary pork production operation. Our ideas are offered as one approach for how costs can be managed. We do not believe that our method is the only, let alone the best, approach for managing costs. There are, no doubt, numerous approaches being used across the industry today to lower costs, as we all struggle to identify ways of surviving. Our approach has worked in one company, New Fashion Pork, Inc., dropping its costs by nearly $3.00/CWT liveweight over the last 3 years or so; so we know it works. Perhaps, there is something in our approach that will work for you.
Cost management occurs at two levels. The first level involves the control of the purchase price of inputs. The price of some inputs is established, often for long periods of time into the future, when the business structure is established; for example, whether barns are owned or contracted. The price of other inputs is established through the day-to-day purchasing practices of the company. Input purchasing is typically centralized, with responsibility being seated at the level of senior management or staff officers hired specifically to purchase the inputs used by the farms. The farm staff typically has no influence over the cost of the inputs that their farms consume. The second level of responsibility occurs at the farm level, where farm staff controls how many units of an input are consumed, called “unit use.” Office staff has little influence on the rate of use of inputs, unless they restrict how many units of an input are delivered to a farm. While it may seem intuitive, low production costs not only require that inputs be purchased competitively BUT ALSO that they be used sparingly. Because cost management occurs at two levels, the office and the farm must work in concert to drive out costs: the office working to purchase inputs as cheaply as possible, the farm staff working to use as few inputs as they can. If either group fails in their responsibility, cost creep occurs.
Pork Production Trends: Forecasting our Future & Trade Issues: The New Normal
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Canada’s pork export growth mirrors the overall growth in Canadian pork production. Over the past 24 years the industry has grown by 84%. This is due to the increase in exports. The top 3 countries that Canada exports to are the US (over 50%), Japan (about 20%), and Mexico (5%). Canada is even increasing its share in world export markets, while the US is steadily decreasing. Canadian slaughter capacity has grown by 45% over 10 years. It has gone from a capacity of 340,000 head per week in 1995 to 490,000 per week in 2004, but it has yet to reach the slaughter of 490,000. The US daily capacity is four times greater than Canadian daily capacity. In Canada there are only 3 slaughter plants that run double slaughter shifts. All major US packers tend to run double shifts, and Olymel and Maple Leaf in Canada have stated their intentions of running a double shift. Maple Leaf has even put in an application for environmental approval to run double shifts. Maple Leaf has purchased the likes of Gainers, Burns, Schneider and Mitchell’s, and Olymel has purchased the likes of Fletcher’s. This brings the Canadian participants to 27 plants owned by 20 different companies. The reason for fewer companies owning larger volumes is economies of scale (that is, they can lower cost of production, increase profit from the volume, and increase competitiveness in the world market). Since 1997, the number of hog operations in Canada has been steadily declining while the number of pigs per farm has been increasing. The leading production firm in Canada is Elite Swine ran by Maple Leaf (they had 122,000 sows in 2003). The leading cause for this is the poor financial returns that plague the industry and force the smaller operations to shut down.
Canadian Swine Identification and Traceability
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The purpose of the traceability system in Canada is to allow movement of pigs to continue at the occurrence of a major disease outbreak. The reason this system came about was because of the scare of the 2002 European outbreak of Foot & Mouth Disease. It brought about the realization that Canada’s high health status is not well equipped to deal with a catastrophic outbreak. The initial objectives of this system were to reduce response time of a foreign animal disease outbreak, address the OIE’s guidelines for zoning, and to identify alternatives to these objectives. The principles of this system are to control disease, eradicate disease, enhance producers risk management programs, simplicity, producer-driven, and more. Geo-referencing provides information about where livestock and buildings are and what types and numbers of livestock are in the buildings. All livestock farms in Canada must be geo-referenced and data needs to be collected each time pigs change locations. Development, implementation of regulation, and readjustments are slated to begin in 2005-2006.
Genetic correlations between reproduction and production traits in swine
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