A Dose of the The New Reality

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

As the week comes to a close, anyone who works in the pork industry likely feels a bit run down, and it has nothing to do with contracting an actual viral infection, but it has everything to do with H1N1 influenza and its unfolding story.
For an agricultural industry that has often been on the leading edge of new developments, technology and change, the pork industry can add another one to its portfolio. It has now been thrown into the limelight as a new media guinea pig. By that I mean, it’s the first industry, certainly agricultural or food industry, to face the influence and fallout from today’s new media and the public’s instant-messaging obsessions and short attention spans. The “old media” outlets are not immune to some finger-pointing as television, radio, newspapers quickly labeled the new influenza virus and
outbreak as “swine flu,” which then spread like wildfire. The 24/7-news-media cycle in which we all live with today requires cable news and others to constantly fill the air waves, and that means talking and talking and talking about everything and anything you can think of related to a particular topic. However, its the “new media” of bloggers, text messages and Twitter where the inaccuracies, rumor and misinformation flourished and trumped patience, clarity and facts. Anti-animal agriculture groups even took advantage of the situation and used the new media vehicles to
campaign deeper and harder against modern agriculture that they so lovely like to label “factory farms.”

Characterization of Lesions in U.S. Cull Sows

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Physical and reproductive conditions of 3,158 cull sows from 2 U.S. Midwestern
harvest facilities were assessed. Body condition, feet, shoulders, teeth, lungs, and
reproductive tracts were visually evaluated for gross lesions at harvest. Based
on the observations of this study, body condition score (BCS) was associated
with several abnormal conditions of sows. Foot-related lesions (overgrown toes,
foot pad lesions) represented the most frequently documented lesions.
Temporal associations of the interactions between lesions and BCS are un-
known. Even though causal relations were not established by this study, the
strong associations observed suggest that sows who do not respond to increased
feeding with improved BCS could reasonably be expected to have additional
lesions that may impact performance and welfare. On-farm management prac-
tices may be related to 1 or more lesions (including foot lesions) that had a high
prevalence in this study.
Farm management practices and nonhuman animal welfare could not be
evaluated with this study so no extrapolation can be given to the type of animal
housing or the antemortem behavior of these sows.

Effects of yeast culture supplementation on growth performance, intestinal health, and immune response of nursery pigs

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The present study was conducted to determine the effects of dietary supplementation of YC on the growth performance, nutrient digestibility, intestinal morphology, intestinal ecology, and immune function changes of nursery pigs compared
with an antibiotic growth promoter (AGP). The results this study indicated that supplementation of 5 g/kg of YC improves growth performance of pigs probably by improving villus height, gut immune response, and nutrient digestibility. The results of the study also suggest that YC could be an alternative to AGP in diets for the weaning pigs.

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

Nest-building behaviour in sows and consequences for pig husbandry

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A better understanding of behaviour patterns in general and farrowing behaviour, including nest-building in sows, is essential for an economically successful pig production. Compared to their ancestor, the wild boar, domestic sows perform nest-building as part of maternal behaviour in a nearly unmodifiedway. However, the pre-parturient behaviour is considerably affected by the husbandry system and is only shown to its full extent when environmental circumstances allow it. If the sow cannot follow her natural behavioural need, for instance when no material is available, she redirects her nest-building behaviour towards the pen or crate equipment. This results in stereotypes and stress, followed by a reduced reproduction performance. With regard to animal health and welfare, loose farrowing systems provide a
good alternative while maintaining a high production performance. As long as these systems are not implemented, the
farmers should provide at least suitable nest-building material like straw. Concluding, further research should evaluate and promote alternative enriched systems in order to support the economic use of these systems for the farmers.

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

Dietary selection for lysine by piglets at differing feeding regimen

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The experiment in this study was conducted to compare dietary preference for lysine (Lys) in piglets when position of two diets offered for a choice was switched repeatedly between the feeders or when diet position remained unchanged throughout the experimental period. The data obtained from this experiment showed that piglets are able to differentiate between diets varying in their Lys concentration and to show preferences for a diet more adequate
in Lys concentration over a Lys-deficient diet. Under the experimental conditions given in this study it seems
not necessary to change diet position between feeders to exclude influences of positional cues on feeding behavior. However, for other choice feeding experiments possibly comparing feeds involving other mechanisms of choice than in the present study, it would probably be more rigorous to change frequently diet position between feeders to ensure conclusions.

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

Milk leptin in sows and blood leptin and growth of their offspring

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The objection of this study was to determine whether sow milk leptin at farrowing was related to neonatal serum leptin and pig growth to weaning. It was concluded that for all pigs’ serum leptin concentrations were not affected by sex of the pig. Milk serum leptin was not associated with litter size, parity, pig birth weight, ADG to weaning or weaning weight. Suckling status did not influence average daily gain (ADG)to weaning or weaning weight of pigs; neonatal pig serum leptin was not related to birth weight, weaning weight, or ADG to weaning. This indicates that leptin is not directly related to early neonatal growth in the pig, but more indepth studies are needed.

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

The effect of weaner diet protein content and diet quality on the long-term performance of pigs to slaughter

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Short and long-term effects of manipulating dietary CP content and diet quality in weaner diets on health and performance of pigs were investigated in a 2 × 2 factorial combination of CP inclusion (high- CP, 230 g of CP/kg vs. low-CP, 170 g of CP/kg) and diet quality (high-quality, cooked cereals, and animal protein vs. low-quality, raw cereals, and plant protein). These results indicate that high-quality diets may protect pig gut health during the immediate postweaning period. However, it may be possible to use less expensive, decreased quality weaner diets without any adverse effects on longterm performance when weaning older, heavier pigs and where health status, environmental control, and stock management are all maintained to a high standard.

Myosin heavy chain isoform content and energy metabolism can be uncoupled in pig skeletal muscle

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The objective of this study was to determine the collective effects of the RN and Hal genes on genes and gene products associated with different muscle fiber types in pig skeletal muscle. At the tissue level, these mutations influence energy metabolism in skeletal muscle and muscle fiber type composition, yet also influence total body composition. To overcome potential pitfalls associated with traditional muscle fiber typing, real-time PCR, gel electrophoresis, and Western blotting were used to evaluate MyHC composition and several energy-related gene expressions in muscles from wild-type, RN, Hal, and Hal-RN mutant pigs. The data collected shows that the RN and Hal gene mutations do alter muscle fibre type and suggest energy metabolism and speed of contraction, can be uncoupled.

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

Reporting 678 putative cSNPs from full-length enriched cDNA sequences of the Korean native pig

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In this study they analysed 1970 high-quality chromatograms (Phred value ‡ 30) that were obtained from sequencing the 5′ ends of brainstem, liver, neocortex and spleen clones derived from full-length enriched cDNA libraries from Korean native pigs. The study showed that analysing genetically diverse pig breeds including the Korean native pig could serve as a useful strategy for generating a large number of single nucleotide polymorphisms.

For more information the full article can be found at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1439-0388/issues

Isolation, expression patterns and SNP frequencies of the porcine PHKG2 gene

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With the development of molecular genetics, genes involved in the main metabolic pathways related to animal
growth and development need more detailed studies. This study was planned with an objective to reveal the sequence, expression profile, genotypes and haplotype frequencies harboring three polymorphisms of the PHKG2 gene in pigs.

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