By Danielle Johnson
This year has been extremely busy for Carthage Veterinary Service’s Research Division, as we have completed and documented the outcome of a number of studies aimed at trying to find solutions for swine producers’ everyday concerns and improve their return on investment.
Below are just five of the studies I’d like to highlight from 2024 publications, that are aimed at improving farrowing and wean outcomes, and ensuring the health and survivability of wean pigs for transport.
Feed intake and litter performance
“Characterizing Sow Feed Intake During Lactation to Explain Litter and Subsequent Farrowing Performance” pulls from a robust data set of more than 4,000 sows over a two-year period. We investigated different sow feed intake patterns during lactation and average daily feed intake (ADFI) within parity.
What we found is that sows that have consistently low ADFI through the lactation period tend to produce litters with significant reduction in average wean weight and higher pre-wean mortality, and they need one or more additional days to return to estrus — compared with sows with above-average ADFI during lactation.
● Young sows (parity 1 and 2) tend to eat less than their mature counterparts (P3-P5), so their litters suffer these effects more.
● Since most sow farms don’t formulate multiple lactation diets by parity, they tend to pick one designed for the “average” sow — but less than 7% of sows fall in this range.
Takeaway: Younger sows need additional support to reach a healthy ADFI when eating the same diet as mature sows. Appetite-stimulating tactics include new feed formulations, top-dressings and/or making them walk around more.
Energy and lysine influence on litters
“Effects of Increasing SID Lysine and Metabolizable Energy (ME) Levels in Lactation Diets Fed to Young and Mature Sows” examined if increasing these two additives above recommended levels would boost litter metrics and subsequent sow reproductive performance.
When we increased ME in the diet of all sows, we did see noticeable improvement in the P1 and P2 animals in litter weight and performance, and increase in piglets weaned; there was not much difference seen in P3-P5 sow litters. Increasing lysine for both populations had less of a plus-effect, maybe because there was potentially already enough in their regular diet.
● P1 and P2 sows fed more ME raised litters about 4 kilograms heavier at weaning and that gained 148 grams more weight daily and accumulated 2.6 kg more total litter weight during lactation compared to young control sows.
● Instead of additive gains, increasing both ME and lysine had a detrimental impact on all sows’ subsequent performance — young sows had a wean-to-estrus 4+ days longer and mature sows’ was nearly three days longer.
Takeaway: Producers should consider and calculate the ROI of increasing ME in their individual operations.
Frequent feeding and stillborn rates
“Neither Increasing the Frequency of Sow Feedings Nor Decreasing the Interval Between Feedings Prior to Farrowing Reduced Piglet Stillbirths” examines if any benefits for fewer stillborns may stem from closing the gap on feeding intervals for farrowing sows. There is already a lot of industry literature on this topic, much of it admittedly conflicting.
A farrowing duration of about 240 minutes is considered typical or safe for a sow; going longer tends to result in an increase in stillbirths. Because sows farrow three more piglets per litter on average now than 20 years ago, delivery time is also longer — so the best way to help them would seem to lie in diet, management or some other factor.
● In this study of 1,501 sows divided evenly between older and younger parity structures, we kept the same feed allocation but at different intervals of one, two and three times a day.
● Two or three meals instead of just one meal resulted in no change to stillborn rates, regardless of farm health status or parity structure.
Takeaway: One recommendation producers can take from this study is that perhaps they don’t need to spend extra time and labor on feeding sows in shorter intervals prior to farrowing — while also, of course, maintaining good husbandry and checking on a farrowing sow more than once a day even if that’s as often as she is fed.
Shedding light on surface cleanliness
Adenosine triphosphate, or ATP, bioluminescence is used in several industries to determine overall cleanliness of surfaces. This works by measuring ATP in organic matter such as microbes, which triggers a reaction similar to a firefly’s tail lighting up. The more organic matter on a surface, the more ATP and the brighter the reaction.
“Evaluation of ATP Bioluminescence for Rapid Determination of Farrowing Room Cleanliness After Pressure Washing at a Commercial Sow Farm” and “Evaluation of ATP Bioluminescence for Rapid Determination of Cleanliness of Livestock Trailers After a Commercial Wash” allowed us to test the technology in these spaces. They are both critical housing for newborn and wean pigs, and it is hoped this tech could improve their health and survivability up to and through transport.
● Bioluminescence detection empowers a producer, driver or other responsible party to decide whether further cleaning is needed in real-time — the other way to determine the presence of potential pathogens is to swab and send to a lab, which takes much longer.
● Usefulness of this tech is likely to be judged on how simple it is to implement and interpret results.
● Will be necessary to establish critical limits for baseline cleanliness based on instrumentation being used, and to review limits for effectiveness of cleaning procedures.
Takeaway: The promise of bioluminescence is exciting because detection provides real-time feedback for decision-making to ensure these areas are healthy for piglets.
Your Next Read: Lactation Feeder Design: How Does it Impact Sow and Litter Performance?
