Assessment of Selected Odour Control Practices in Swine Barns Using an In-house Panel

Posted in: Prairie Swine Centre by admin on January 1, 2007 | No Comments

Developing cost-effective ways to reduce and assess odours from swine barns is a continuing need for the industry. The goal of this work was to use an in-house panel of assessors to evaluate the intensity and offensiveness of odour from three swine grow-finish rooms with different applied management practices – conventional, intensive cleaning, and manure pit treatment. The conventionally managed room served as the control, while the intensively cleaned room simulated the highest level of cleanliness practically possible. Pit treatment involved weekly spraying of a commercial additive on the surface of the accumulated manure slurry in the manure pits at a rate of 500 ppm. Two bagged air samples were collected for each room weekly. Each panellist then assessed the coded sample bags three times in random order. Pit treatment intensity scores were significantly higher than the other treatments, indicating no positive improvement in odour intensity from the use of the additive. Although not shown to be statistically significant in this work, high level of cleanliness and appropriate housekeeping noticeably reduced odour intensity in the room compared to a conventional swine room.

My Vision of the Future: It Includes Pork Production & Here's Why?

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Starch kinetics and fibre fermentation of peas in pigs

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The digestible (DE) and net energy (NE) content of peas in pigs is very variable and that variability mainly depends on genetic and environmental factors. On the contrary, it can hardly be explained by differences in chemical composition. In order to find out an explanation, other factors such as the rate of starch hydrolysis in the small intestine or the rate of fibre fermentation in the large intestine were investigated and the results were correlated to the DE content of the peas and their chemical composition. Laboratory techniques that mimic the digestive and fermentative processes in the pig’s digestive tract were used to try to find an explanation. The results showed a wide range of variation in starch hydrolysis in the small intestine but no variation in fibre fermentation in the large intestine between pea varieties grown in different conditions. Moreover, no correlations were established either between the chemical composition and the rate of starch hydrolysis or between starch hydrolysis and the digestible energy content.

Impact of Feeding Micro-Aid® to Sows on Litter Performance

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Micro-Aid is an all-natural product, produced from a plant extract and has been marketed primarily as a mediator of emissions from animal manures. Anecdotal reports have stated that feeding Micro-Aidâ to sows increases the level of immunoglobulins in colostrum which many enhance piglet growth. The objectives of this experiment were to determine the impact of Micro-Aidâ on the levels of immunoglobulins in sow colostrum and piglet blood and subsequently on the impact on weight gain in piglets when included in the sow’s diet at 125 ppm for either 5 or 30 days pre-farrowing. The inclusion of 125 ppm of Micro-Aidâ in the diet of gestating sows for 30 days pre- farrowing resulted in 1 additional pig per litter. This result appears to be primarily due to a decrease in stillborns, rather than an effect via IgG concentrations delivered to the pigs prenatally. There was no effect of Micro-Aidâ on average birth weight, nor growth of the piglets from birth to weaning.

Production vs. Profit: Balancing Revenues and Costs

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Response of growing and finishing pigs to high and low crude protein diets

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Availability of crystalline amino acids has allowed reduction in the crude protein (CP) content of swine diets. Low CP diets supplemented with essential amino acids can decrease nitrogen excretion in the manure and is often more cost effective than using an additional amount of the particular protein source. Two experiments were conducted to study the performance of growing and finishing pigs fed high and low CP (4% lower) diets supplemented with crystalline amino acids. These experiment confirmed that performance could be maintained when either high or low crude protein diets are fed if amino acids are balanced and the diets are formulated to be similar in net energy.

Does Marketing Heavier Weights Pay

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Changes in agricultural policy throughout North America have seen a significant shift in the production and consumption of traditional feed grains. In particular the development of the ethanol industry will create significant challenges for the feeding sectors, especially in years when grain supplies may be limiting. Within the past 12 months pork producers within western Canada have experienced an increase in feed prices of between $10 – $16 per hog marketed.

Historically low feed grain prices through the previous two years have resulted in a higher finished hog weight, simply put, because pork producers generated a higher net income due to the low cost per kg gain. In addition, packers within western Canada have also taken this lead, through grid and loin premium enhancements that encouraged pork producers to increase market hog weight. Rising feed costs and fluctuating market hog prices are generating tight profit margins. Does marketing hogs at heavier weights continue to generate the greatest profit potential?

Large Group and Auto Sort Systems

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High-Oil Oat Groats for Weaned Pigs

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After weaning, young pigs need highly palatable, digestible diets, devoid of antinutritional factors and with high digestible energy (DE) content. Feed ingredients corresponding to that description are generally expensive and choice is quite limited. One alternative could be oat groats (dehulled oats) with high oil content. Oat groats are well consumed and digested by young pigs and have the highest lysine content among all the cereal species used in swine nutrition (Van Barneveld et al., 1998; J. Sci. Food Agric. 76, 277). The specific objective of this study was to determine the nutritional value of high-oil oat groats and their effect on the growth performances of weaned pigs. The groats contained 95 g oil, 159 g crude protein and 3,724 kcal DE/kg DM. Weaned pigs fed for 4 weeks (7 to 22 kg) with diets containing graded levels (0, 15, 30, 45%) of oat groats, incorporated at the expense of wheat and soybean meal (85%-15%), presented average daily gains similar to those obtained with wheat. In conclusion, high-oil oat groats can replace wheat in diets for weaned pigs because of the high protein content and the relatively good quality of the oat proteins.

Checklist to Determine Causes of Shortfalls in Feed Intake

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This is a set of questions that hog producers must ask themselves. The answers to the questions will give an indication of the diets producers are feeding their animals. They will help producers determine where their diets need improvements.