Winter weather requires constant vigilance to maintain pig health and barn infrastructure. After all, Murphy’s Law that “anything that can go wrong, will go wrong,” is almost always true in the dead of winter.
“During the first real cold of the year, there is always a heater that doesn’t kick on or a water line that freezes up,” said Adam Annegers, sow production manager at JBS, during the recent State of the Pork Industry Report. “Things just happen during that first cold snap.”
Freezing Failures
For Randy Kuker, director of swine production for The Equity, the biggest challenge his team faced during the recent snowstorm occurred on an empty site as it started to fill with pigs.
“You try to take all the precautions and do the right things,” Kuker says. “We were starting up a feed line that had some frozen ice in it, then the PVC snapped. Now we had to try to repair a PVC line in the cold temperatures – that’s not fun.”
When the snow starts to fall, Kuker encourages producers to make sure they clear snow away from tunnel curtains to prevent gaps and check pit fans for drifts to ensure proper airflow. Additionally, monitoring snow load on roofs is essential to prevent structural collapse.
“Winter brings a lot of challenges and keeps you on your toes, and that’s just outside the barn,” Kuker says. “That doesn’t even take into account inside the barn.”
Production Priorities
Inside the barn, ventilation is key to managing humidity and preventing disease, he says. Producers should monitor probe temperatures to ensure they are not in front of inlets, which causes heaters to run longer than necessary. Minimum fan speeds must be set correctly to balance heat retention with air quality.
Ventilation, feed and water quality are important every day to keep pigs performing well, emphasizes Brad Eckberg, account executive at MTech Systems.
To maximize profits, consider increasing breed targets by 5% to 10% during the fourth quarter to ensure full-crate utilization for high-value summer markets, Eckberg adds. Focus on body condition and parity distribution to maintain high farrowing rates.
Stress and Survival
Eckberg reminds producers that cold stress is a potential trigger for disease. During transport, cold stress increases mortality. What can producers do to protect pigs from cold stress during transport?
Start by making sure that trailers have adequate bedding and closed sides.
“We need to make sure that we’ve got the sides closed up enough that the route is safe,” says Cara Haden, DVM, director of animal welfare and biosecurity with Pipestone. “We need to make sure we’re not going to get stuck en route, that we’re moving loads if we need to off of these days that are so cold, or where there’s a chance that we’re going to get stuck in a snowstorm and not make it to the barn.”
Cold stress creates significant implications.
“If pigs get cold stress and then things like drafting or heater issues arise, that can trigger more issues,” Haden says. “If you get the pigs to the barn and your heater goes out for a couple hours in this type of cold, we need to make sure we’re responding quickly, because that can impact the health of a pig, too.”
“If pigs get cold stress and then things like drafting or heater issues arise, that can trigger more issues.”
What’s Your Backup Plan?
She says it’s also important to note Scott Dee’s snowball experiment proved that porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV) and porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV) love blowing snow.
“They can move in blowing snow. They can move on vehicles that are covered in snow,” Haden says. “This time of year, we need to be super diligent.”
But ice makes diligence more challenging, she adds.
“When we go to disinfect a chute, trailer or a truck, disinfectants need to dry in order to function appropriately,” Haden says. “We need to make sure we’re either getting those in a warm enough environment that we can dry, that we’re adding propylene glycol along with our disinfectants, and ultimately are getting things as clean as they need to be.”
Create a backup plan, she advises.
“If your lines freeze and you’re supposed to be disinfecting a chute or a trailer, what will you do?” Haden asks. “There are products like ChloroSorb, which is a dry powder that we can use. We’ve got to have those plans in place so that we don’t end up having dirty trucks or dirty trailers going down the road because of some sort of freezing issue.”
Watch or listen to their entire discussion that delves into the impact of winter on your operation, wean pig health and nutrition tips, and conversations taking place at trade shows and more in the Farm Journal’s PORK State of the Pork Industry Report.
