Source: PigBusiness
Text: Reinout Citizens
There is a good chance that free-range breeding will become the norm, but there is little experience of free-range breeding. Reason for WUR and VKON in pigs Jarno Brummelhuis organise a road show. A striking aspect: Topigs performs it on their test farm in Canada to achieve a low dropout without locking the sows.
Few sow holders have free-loop stalls. Partly because of the low level of investment due to difficult licence applications, but also because there is no mandatory legislation requiring such a nursery system. That can change in the future now also the EFSA (European Food and Product Authority) the no longer restraining animals. In any case, the fact that there are few free-range breeding pigs is not due to lack of interest from pig farmers.
At the road show at Jarno Brummelhuis in Hoge Hexel (OV) only pig farmers were present, some of whom had experience with free-range breeding. Because of great interest, VKON is organizing a second road show on free movement stalls. Roadshows are part of the Knowledge on Maat-project "Roadshow" Profit from a well-equipped activity area for pigs and are drawn by WUR and VKON.
WUR researcher Marko Ruis is closely involved in the road shows and he sees that there is a great deal of international attention for free-range breeding. This could indeed become legislation and it is good that pig farmers are already working on it. What Jarno has here is at least a very nice concept
Simple design
Topigs Norsvin subfokker Jarno Brummelhuis has more than ten years of experience in free-range breeding lofts. At his farm he has 530 breeding sows, with which they breed TN50 and TN70 breeding gels. He's been using the week system for a year at 5 weeks of age. The carrying sows arrive in the free-running stalls just before the expected date of litter and leave after 5 weeks (at the time of teating) while the weaned piglets remain in the loft. So little changes for the piglets. The free-range nursery has been extensively tested with us and is easy to set up. Brummelhuis tells the pig farmers that it was conceived by the farmer and looked from the animal.
The success of free-range breeding stalls is the simplicity to me. the overview during controls, ease of labor, feeding by pig and sow to eat together, no teat tip, less flush water, lower heating costs and of course animal welfare. Big and sow should now show their natural behavior. Requirements are a quiet sow with good and strong legwork, which gives her the strength to lie quietly and not collapse and of course robust smooth piglets
Free range testing
Brummelhuis' first free-range breeding pigs tested on his own farm were the Pro Dromi breeding pigs, but since the nanny breeding pigs did not fit in with the maternity breeding concept, the pig farmer developed his own free-range breeding pigs. In the test range with six nursery stalls, he tested different sets for two years from 2014. During those two test years, Brummelhuis has improved the clearing together with Nijenkamp and now there is a system that works well in practice and is rid of all unnecessary issues. In December 2016 the opening of the new free-range nursery was with 11 departments and 22 lofts per department.
Brummel house: Wednesday we spray the stalls clean and on Thursday we impose 22 sows. and we put the sows in a pen of 22 sows. That happens very quietly and with all 22 sows at once. The gates are easy to operate. On Monday we temporarily capture the sows and the division temperature is 22 degrees Celcius. During the week the piglets are born. On Thursday, when the last piglets are born, we lower the temperature to 19 degrees Celcius. Five to seven days after birth, the sow may be released. The piglets are safe in the piglets' nest until then. The piglets and the sow want to be together, hence the piglets' nest is placed next to the head of the sow
The innovative subfokker had initially released the sows after three days, but then it turned out that the drop-out was a little higher, so he now leaves them a little longer.
The drop-out in us is similar to the old situation and other crowning socks
An important aspect of free-range breeding is the interaction between sow and pig, allowing them to show more natural behavior like learning to eat. That's what you see as the sow eats; then the piglets also want to eat. They've been doing that for three days. That is why we are very conscious of the low level of unemployment PT0 KZB family feeders chosen. The waste of feed is minimal, according to research in the dung pit on feed residues
With a high bowl there is more bruising, because the sow wants to feed the piglets from a natural instinct and push the feed over the baking edge.
Eating behavior freeloop krogenok
Brummelhuis isn't the only speaker on the Roadshow. Anouschka Middelkoop, researcher Swine Nutrition Schothorst Feed Research (SFR), explains about the free-range solenoids at SFR and then about eating together, together learn about the eating behaviour of piglets in free-range solenoids. On SFR the sow remains fixed about four days after birth, using a balance floor under the sow. This one goes up when the sow gets up.
After the switch to free movement, we saw a reduction in the percentage of dead beams, from 6 to 4.3 percent, and we were able to reduce the mortality in the stand. We're gonna spend time alternately on 30 days, where they're going to the teat bar. Unlike Brummelhuis, we use high feed troughs. This is because we want to know and measure what the pig eats and what the sow eats, since we're a research company. However, free-range pigs offer many additional opportunities for piglets to learn to eat by the sow. There are also more applications to offer different types of feed
Middelkoop continues her story In nature, piglets begin to forage and discover on day 5. On day 10 big and sow already eat together and the piglets learn from the sow what, where and how to eat. This can be applied in the stand using a family eating system, for example by feeding the sow in a low feed bowl. With a family eating system instead of a high bowl you have according to Medium buy more opportunities for the pig to see what and how the sow eats. A pig is more likely to eat when the other pigs are near the bowl. Besides, the pig wants to eat the same as the others. In studies with a family eating system, 73 percent of piglets learn to eat for teatage, especially at a younger age. This can lead to higher feed intake and growth
Improved digestion and efficiency
By starting early offering solid feed to lactating piglets, they not only have time to learn to eat the sow, but also have time to develop well and adapt to this nutritional change. It is therefore important to provide the same piglets feed around teats, because the pig and intestinal pack is used to it. Middelkoop hampered that piglets also eat sow food at all. It is even an advantage, because because they eat sow food the gut flakes become longer and thus the intestinal surface larger. Because of the larger intestinal surface there is better digestion and efficiency.
In addition, Middelkoop's PhD research has shown that by offering several types of feed, you can increase the feed intake of piglets. By allowing piglets to eat from the lacto feed with the sow, in addition to the passing of piglets feed in their own tray, the total fixed feed intake will be higher. This ensures a good start after teating, and sometimes even a higher teat weight. To get piglets to eat, it is also important that the feed is supplied fresh, large chunks of piglets can help to master this motorly, and it can help to offer the feed wet first.
Brummelhuis largely applies the same principles as Middelkoop. For example, the PT0 family feed bowl (KZB) is accessible to the piglets because it is on the floor and the piglets already get a small container with the same piglets feed that they get after teating. The piglets first take the large pieces from the feed bowl according to the experience of the pig farmer. Because the pig and sows keep the PT0 family feeder clean themselves, the piglets always have fresh feed.
Parent Properties
Genetics and free-range cogs are part of each other, because precisely because the sow is free, it must be calm and have good maternal characteristics. The breeding organisations can select on that. In its new innovation centre in Canada Innova, Topigs Norsvin is conducting a research on free-range breeding. Why? The breeding organisation is convinced that free movement will also become the future and will be laid down in the legislation. We always breed for the future, says Lisette van der Zande, researcher at Topigs Norsvin. Because breeding takes time. That also means looking at what legislation will do in the field of animal welfare and responding to our genetics. So we're also investigating the use of freewalk frogs and in Canada we have the Prodromi. I'm investigating the behaviour of piglets and sows in the free-range pigs and the risk of higher dropout. Sometimes we have the sows loose after a day or we don't lock them up at all. The interaction between big and sow is important. Why could there be a higher fallout? That may be due to a rude sow, but it may also have to do with the vitality of the piglets. We can select the breeding value parent characteristics. In Canada cameras hang to follow the behavior and the Topigs Norsvin researcher can see it at any time in the Netherlands. The research aims to select genetics and to include the data in breeding programmes. What Van der Zande sees in the free-range cogs is that the higher the breeding value mother characteristics, the lower the piglets mortality. This effect can be seen mainly in the free-range housing and not in the standard loft. The fallout in the free-range sockets is now at the same level as that of the standard lofts. With the cameras we capture the interaction between big and sow. How many times, where and what. So we can control extra behavior with the aim of reducing the failure. However, we have been selecting mother properties for years, but in a free-range stand that is especially important
Stomach beams are dead sleepers
However, the study already shows other encouraging results. We see that the attitude of the sow predicts whether there will be a high or low percentage of failure. Sows with one or more dead sleepers appear to be more on their belly. Why? Maybe something with the legwork or udder. If they have udder infection, they are often on their stomachs. We could have done this before throwing and could be used as a management tool. It is also mainly the small piglets that fail
It is striking that Brummelhuis has more or less the same experience. Sows that have a common nursery have a high dropout rate, also found a higher fallout in the walk, and vice versa. Perhaps genetics has an important influence on failure than just the nursery system. For Brummelhuis the free-range nursery is the ideal nursery. At least for us. The numbers are the same as in the old situation and it is a lot more relaxed working. The fallout always remains a point of attention and we therefore select our sows here too
