Considerations for Large Group Housing of Finishing Pigs

Posted in: Prairie Swine Centre by admin on January 1, 2004 | No Comments

The objectives of large group housing (LGH) are reduce labour, increase pigs marketed in the ideal weight range, reduce overall production costs, and enhance animal welfare. The most typical system is a fully slatted floor. Positives in regard to facilities include pigs having greater selection of a comfort zone; avoid aggression, better observation, and more. Negatives include lack of knowledge in airflow and dunging patterns. Water may need to be added to certain areas to improve the flow in the pits and ammonia could be a problem with fully slatted floors. Positives in regard to equipment include less penning, reduced feed system costs, reduced water system delivery cost and maintenance, reduced cost of ventilation equipment. Negatives include the addition of more equipment requiring more maintenance. Event sort is the sorting of a large group at one time for one event, while continuous sort will sort pigs based on weight on a continuous basis. Equipment used in sorting includes a return gate, feeder, sorter (needs to be strong, dependable, easy to operate and clean, provide protection, and must be placed well), and drinkers. Positives for building cost include less pen partitions, less unusable floor space associated with dividers, reduced cost of floor space as alleys, and more. Negatives include construction costs of $25-30 more per pig space for fully slatted over partially slatted design and the cost of an automatic sorter. Positives for labour include reduced time spent manually sorting and weighing, reduced time to check feeders and drinkers, reduced washing time, and more. Negatives include maintenance with the pigs in the pen, pig swarms, working with individual pigs, removing dead pigs, and more. Positives for operating costs include weighing, sorting, washing, reduced wash water volume, feed restriction, reduced maintenance, and more. Negatives include possible maintenance increase if sorter is faulty. Performance is increased when more pigs can hit the core grid target due to the auto sort. Positives for health status include fewer partitions for disease to hide, less fighting due to more space, and a hospital pen. Negatives include increased risk of disease spreading, vaccination is more difficult, daily health check needs to be more intense, and more. Animal welfare advantages include less aggression/fighting and it looks good in the eyes of the public. Injured animals may be more difficult to find though. Pork quality is increased due to less stress and easier management.

Manure handling systems reduce air contaminants in swine barns

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Two manure-handling systems, a washing gutter and an inclined washed conveyor belt, ere tested to determine which system best eliminates all manure contamination from the experimental chambers in an air quality laboratory. Both systems proved efficient at reducing the air contamination from the excreta. However, neither system totally eliminated the release of contaminants to the airspace.

Gestating sows: All group housing is not the same, but neither are all stalls

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Too often we hear statements concerning ‘group housing’ and ‘stalls’ that imply that all such systems are the same. Group systems in particular are extremely different in how they control feed intake and manage aggression. It is important that we understand which particular group and stall systems are being compared. Gestation housing for sows is more complex than is often implied by generalizations. There are numerous group housing systems being used for gestating sows, but they generally fall within four general types. Floor feeding systems involve spreading a limited amount of feed over a large floor area and there is relatively poor control over individual feed intake, and high levels of aggression during feeding. The animals are often kept in small groups to minimize both re-grouping and feeding related aggression. Another type of group housing provides a feeding site for each sow, and feed is dropped into these sites at a speed slightly slower than the animals can eat it. Each sow stands at a feeding site waiting for the feed, rather than attempting to take feed from another sow. These ‘trickle’ feeding systems control individual feed intake and feeding associated aggression fairly well, but animals must still be re-grouped and group size must be kept small. A third type of group housing provides individual feeding stalls, and an open area for the non-feeding period. Feed intake is very well controlled, as is feeding-associated aggression. However, such a system still involves re-grouping aggression, requires a great deal of space, and still requires individual stalls. A final type of group housing system involves the use of electronic sow feeders. In such a system each sow in the group wears an electronic identification tag and a computer and an electronic stall control feeding. When the sow enters the feeding stall she is identified by means of her tag, her records are checked on the computer, and her daily allotment of feed is provided to her. This system provides very good control over individual feed intake and prevents much of the feeding associated aggression, but still involves re-grouping fighting. The feeding and control equipment is more costly than in most other systems, but the computer can be used in other aspects of management. Not all group-housing systems are the same. Each achieves the goals of controlling individual feed intake and aggression to a different degree. If the farm has a stall housing system it is usually one size usually 22 or 24 inches (56 or 61 cm) wide. The Code of Practice makes the logical recommendation that the size of stall should depend upon the size of the sow. This study used the suggested sizes in the Code to develop a formula for width based on sow weight. The demographics were then estimated for the herd once a stable population was reached. Based on this data, stalls ranging from 22 to 28 inches (56 to 72 cm) in width were included, in proportions that should match the size of sows in the mature herd. For each weekly breeding group there are four narrow stalls for small gilts, several stalls for second and third parity sows, a few less for 4th and 5th parity animals, and two 28 inch (72 cm) stalls for 6th parity animals. Hopefully by allotting animals to stalls based on their size it will reduce injuries and improve longevity.

Greenhouse gas emission from NAP-covered earthen manure storage basin

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The objective of a negative air pressure (NAP) cover in reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from an earthen manure storage basin (EMB). GHG emissions were measured from the same EMB when it was uncovered and covered with chopped straw in 2001, 2002 and 2003, and compared with the emissions from the NAP-covered EMB in 2004. The 2.cell EMB was located at the 600 sow farrow-to-finish operation of PSC Elstow research Farm Inc. near Elstow, Saskatchewan.

Dietary phytase reduces phosphorus excretion in weanling pigs

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Excessive phosphorus (P) output in the manure is a concern because it can leach into groundwater and/or may limit manure application onto certain lands. The addition of phytase enzyme to the diet of weanling pigs decreased total and water-soluble P output in the manure. This effects was reduced when dietary calcium was high relative to P (Ca:P ratios above 1.7:1). Phytase had only modest effects on performance.

A Review of Large Group Housing

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Over the past 5 years the concept of large groups of grower-finisher pigs has expanded. Not only does it include extensive (outdoor raised) operations and hoop structure barns but the conversion or special construction of conventional housing modified to accommodate groups much larger than the traditional 20 pigs per pen. Why? There were four drivers: A desire to reduce construction costs by simplifying penning and barn design; herd sizes were becoming large enough that large groups could be formed without commingling ages; electronic sorting technology provided a means to deal with the critical task of accurately separating at market without high labour costs; and finally improved use of space could improve profitability and relieve the crowding effect brought on by higher sow productivity over the past decade.

Interaction among lactose, plasma proteins and crowding in weanlings

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The addition of 4% plasma and 30% lactose to the diets of weanling pigs modestly improved performance; however this effect was observed only during the initial 7 days post-weaning. There were no interactive effects of plasma with lactose, and the results were independent of starting weight. Crowding decreased performance by day 49 of the nursery period.

Amino Acid Requirements Based on Protein Deposition Rates

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Introduction

The pace of change in swine diet formulation over the past decade has been truly staggering. During the 1990’s, we successfully adopted a number of new technologies. The use of phase feeding is now almost universal. Diets are formulated on digestible rather than total amino acids, and the next step, to true digestible amino acids, appears to be just around the corner. We have a much better understanding of the relationship between whole body growth, protein/lean accretion and nutrient supply in the diet.

As important as defining nutrient requirements may be, supplying those nutrients using available ingredients must occur with the same precision. We are just beginning to understand the impact of ingredient variability, especially in energy content, on the accuracy of diet formulation; the next decade should present exciting new developments in this important area.

Finally, perhaps the most important development of the 1990’s has been the recognition that economy is as important as productivity; feeding programs are increasingly evaluated as much on the basis of cost per kg of gain, or cost per pig sold, or profit per pig space, as on days to market and average carcass index.

Crowding reduces performance of weanling pigs

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The effect of floor space allowance on the performance of weanling pigs was examined by housing groups of 17 pigs in pens with a floor space of either 5.58 m2 (uncrowded) or 4.00 m2 (crowded). Crowding adversely affected growth and feed intake by week 4 post-weaning. These data support the current recommendations on floor space allowance for weanling pigs.

Response of Growing-Finishing Pigs to Dietary Energy Concentration

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The primary objective of pork production is to produce lean meat in a cost effective and sustainable manner. From a nutritional perspective, energy is perhaps the most critical nutrient, because it is the most expensive to provide in the diet and because gut capacity may limit the ability of the pig to consume sufficient quantities to achieve their full genetic potential for growth. It is generally assumed that feeding a higher nutrient density diet will enhance pig performance. The only outstanding question in most people’s minds is at what point does the higher cost of the high energy diet exceed the value of improved animal performance.

Confounding this logic is recent research at the Prairie Swine Centre showing that pigs do not always respond to higher energy diets with improved performance. Indeed, we have completed no less than 4 studies with nursery pigs showing no increase in growth rate when dietary energy was increased. Have we been wrong all these years in feeding high energy diets in order to achieve improved performance?

There are other reasons for wanting a better understanding of how the pig uses energy. For example, our knowledge of amino acid metabolism is rapidly increasing, with literally dozens of experiments on this subject completed each year. We are rapidly getting to the point where a nutritionist can estimate with a reasonable degree of accuracy, the optimum level of lysine and other amino acids required for a given farm operating under a given financial environment. However, before we can take full advantage of our knowledge on amino acids, we must have an equivalent understanding of energy – and that is certainly not the case at the present time.