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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:
Effects of Farm Handling on Physiological Responses, Losses and Meat Quality of Commercial Pigs
Posted in: Meat Quality, Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on May 6, 2011 | No Comments
Stressful transport to the slaughterhouse can result in more mortalities, an increase in non-ambulatory pigs, more condemned carcasses, and poorer meat quality. By decreasing the stress during transport there will be less economic loss, higher meat quality, and better animal welfare. Feed withdrawal before transport helps by reducing fatigue during transfer, making handling easier, lessening transport sickness, reducing carcass contamination, and improving meat quality (from increased pH). In older farm facilities corridors would have been designed for a lighter pig, and given that pig size has increased they may be too narrow for current pigs. This can lead to increased stress in loading, and increased injury. The use of electric prods has been shown to increase the heart rate of pigs throughout the transport, resulting in higher stress and more mortalities. Programs encouraging transporters to slow down, and hydraulic lifts are two final ways to reduce stress during transport. Using these strategies the stress during transport can be reduced, and economic losses minimized.
Reducing Distress in Swine: When, Why and How
Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on March 30, 2011 | No Comments
Pain is often hard to identify due to evolutionary strategies in prey species to hide it, and once identified it is difficult to objectively measure. In the past, few products were available for agricultural animal pain control, and little differentiation was made between tranquilizers and pain control. Providing pain control to animals can have an economic benefit through improved healing, and an ethical benefit through improved animal welfare. For sows and gilts, tranquilizers can be used around farrowing for extremely agitated animals, manual aid and oxytocin can be used for long farrowings, and the treatment of lameness with analgesics are ways to reduce suffering. Suckling pigs should be aided around the time of birth, and any lameness, scour, or injuries treated. In nursery pigs, scour can be treated, meningitis may be helped by an anti-inflammatory, and lameness can be treated and the pig isolated to a recovery pen. Pain in finishing pigs can be handled by isolation to a recovery pen, and shipping out if no improvement is seen. Often the reduced stress and ability to rest in a hospital pen can reduce suffering caused by pain, and a veterinarian should be consulted for any available treatment or pain control.
Effect of local anaesthesia and/or analgesia on pain responses induced by piglet castration
Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Research Watch, Welfare by admin on January 1, 2011 | No Comments
A study was done to find out if pain could be reduced during piglet castration. By treating pigs with local anaesthesia before castration and analgesia after castration it was determined that the pain reduction was effective.
Animal welfare and the veterinary profession: 50 years of change
Posted in: Welfare by admin on July 5, 2010 | No Comments
About 10 years ago I received an unexpected telephone call. It was from the Burger King Corporation to say that the company wanted to create a program to assure their customers about the welfare of the animals in their supply chain, and would I serve on the advisory committee. I admit to having been a trifl e skeptical. Fast food restaurants as agents of social change? – it did not quite fi t the popular stereotype. But I joined the committee and was pleasantly surprised to fi nd myself in discussions about maintaining public trust and ‘doing the right thing’ for animals. To cut a long story short, Burger King’s engagement in animal welfare led to some tangible changes. In fact Temple Grandin 2000), after years of inspecting slaughter plants with mediocre animal welfare standards, reported a dramatic improvement immediately after chain restaurants became involved.
Effect of pain relief at piglet castration and farrowing on welfare and performance of piglets
Posted in: Ontario Pork, Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on June 14, 2010 | No Comments
This study tests the effects of analgesia on piglets to see if it reduces pain and has any impact on growth performance. Two trials were carried out, the first was done on piglets, where some would receive analgesia before castration and some wouldn’t. Then the were tracked to see how they differed in mortality rate and average daily weight gain to weaning. The second trail involved giving the analgesia to the sow before and during farrowing and then stillbirths, growth rate to weaning and pre weaning mortality was recorded. For trial one there was no difference in ADG or mortality between the groups, and a subjective evaluation of the piglets pain during castration found no variation between groups. For the second trial there was no significant difference between groups for pre weaning mortality, number of piglets crushed, ADG or stillbirths. The use of analgesia increases the time of castration and has costs associated with purchasing the drugs. There was no difference found between pigs who were on the drugs and those that were not, the use of analgesia was found to have no benefit to producers.
Effect of plasmid pTENT2 on severity of porcine post-weaning diarrhoea induced by an O149 enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli
Posted in: Ontario Pork, Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on April 10, 2010 | No Comments
A particularly virulent O149:H10 enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli clone harbours a newly characterized plasmid pTENT2 carrying the tetracycline-resistance tetA and the virulence genes estA, paa, and sepA that were not present in less virulent clones. The objectives of this study were to assess whether the additional genes on pTENT2 played a role in the increased severity of post-weaning diarrhoea and if they provided any potential advantage for the emergence of the highly virulent clone. Groups of pigs were dosed orally with isogenic pTENT2-positive and pTENT2-negative ETEC strains, and the clinical and pathological changes were compared between the groups. Two additional groups were given the pTENT2-positive strains and maintained on feed with or without chlortetracycline to assess the effect of subtherapeutic levels of tetracycline on the short-term persistence of the ETEC O149:H10 clone. The severity of diarrhoea within the first few hours post-inoculation was significantly increased ( p = 0.0408) in animals receiving pTENT2-positive strains as compared to animals receiving pTENT2-negative strains. There were no consistent or significant histopathological differences between any of the groups and no significant difference in the persistence of ETEC between groups.
Alternative Farrowing Options
Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on April 1, 2010 | No Comments
Some of the advantages of using alternative farrowing options include supplying a niche market, increased sow welfare, more sustainable production, and setting an industry example. However, the challenges with an alternative system include increased pre-wean mortality, labour and space requirements, and stricter protocols.
Alternative Farrowing Systems
Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on | No Comments
Free-range farrowing pens allow sows to express more natural behaviour before, during, and after farrowing. The litter size increases as well; however, the rate of piglet crushing increases compared to farrowing crates. Proper management can help reduce crushing. Some of the management techniques include installing a crush bar in front of the nest box, and having an optimal nesting spot. Piglets will choose to lie in the nesting box if it has enough straw and space, is easy to access, and is the right temperature, which will reduce their chance of being crushed. Calm sows with good milk production crush fewer piglets, as do gilts. A gilt that crushes more than 2 piglets should not be re-bred, and replacement litters should be chosen from sows with strong mothering abilities. Farrowing pens allow a cleaner, higher welfare option to farrowing crates, and with proper management can maintain or increase production.
Green Initiatives: Overall Evaluation of Innovative Pig Fattening Systems for Animal-Welfare Label Production
Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on | No Comments
There are increasing concerns about animal welfare in agriculture, so four pig-fattening systems were evaluated for animal welfare and for productivity. Welfare was evaluated by observation, pen condition scoring, and equipment (feeders, ventilation etc.) records. The four types of systems were an improved conventional system, a sloped floor system, an open front stable, and an outdoor exercise stable. The outdoor access (open front and exercise stable) increased lying, and decreased behaviour disorders. Straw reduced injuries, but required more work per animal. All systems ended with a good score for productivity and animal welfare, but the open front and outdoor exercise yards were the best, and also were scored the highest for animal preference.
EU-Welfare legislation on pigs
Posted in: Pork Insight Articles, Welfare by admin on March 30, 2010 | No Comments
The people of Europe consider the welfare of their livestock animals before they eat them. They are concerned about pigs being kept in dark, tight quarters with boring housing conditions. They are also concerned about painful procedures like castration and tail docking. There were standards set by the European Commission on pig production. The standards were originally made in 1991 and are soon coming up for review. It is unknown how the new standards will turn out. But an assessment of the current situation has the potential to provide evidence as to how it will turnout. This report gives a brief overview of the EU pig welfare legislation. It also provides a look at what national governments have been funding regarding pig welfare research.