The Rural Voice, 2001-08, Page 64PERTH 1!I*
County Pork Producers NEWSLETTER
Jim Van Herk, President
519-595-4863
• The Rural Voice is provided to Perth
County Pork Producers by the PCPPA.
Some thoughts on swine research
Any opinions expressed herein may
not necessarily reflect the views of the
Perth County Pork Producers'
Association.
Recently, I was given the
opportunity, as many of you also had,
to participate in a meeting put on by
Ontario Pork and Ontario Pork
Industry Council (OPIC) with the
purpose to set direction and priorities
for swine research. There were many
topics discussed including funding for
research, direction, specific research
topics and finally communicating the
results back to industry and in
particular to you, the producer. I
would like to focus on some of the
discussions and opinions around the
research of herd health, something I'm
far from an expert in and in fact know
very little about.
As most of you are aware, pigs and
disease go hand in hand. I wouldn't
say they are inseparable, simply
because we are constantly working to
separate the two. The conversations at
our table began with discussions on
disease(s) and the important ones of
the day. It was, of, course, agreed that
more research needed to be done
toward the goal of control and
eradication of diseases. The diseases
were prioritized somewhere along
these lines from most important to
important but somewhat less so. Here
goes – PRRS, Strepsuis, Circovirus,
Postweaning Multisytemic Wasting
Syndrome, the pneumonias, Enteritis
actinobacillus pleuropneumonia and
swine dysentery. We then talked about
something significantly more
interesting to me — that being
furthering the research on the
protection and enhancement of the
pig's immune system.
Studying the pig's immune system
is where it's at for me. Diseases are
always there and it would seem that
this is a never ending challenge. There
are always new treatments to discover,
etc. When we turn this upside down
and find ways for the pig to fight off
its own challenges, new treatments and
expensive drugs will be a last resort.
(I'm dreaming right?)
Here is an example in my mind of
impaired immune systems and good
ones. Can you remember the last year
that we had that really good corn? The
pigs took off in growth rate in October
and you couldn't get them out the door
fast enough. Where was all the disease
challenge? Personally, I think it was
still there. The pigs were just better
able to cope with its because their
immune system was intact.
On the opposite end of this example
is the year where you had corn that
you couldn't wait to be done with.
Your pigs did poorly, pneumonia was
always lurking somewhere, maybe
even PRRS. Hopefully nothing new
would blow in because surely your
pigs would catch it. To me this is
simply a situation of an impaired
immune system. The pigs are just not
able to put up a good defense against
disease challenge.
In most cases I would bet that the
same diseases are present so it likely
isn't some new thing, just a new
problem with an old disease. The
problem could be toxins in the corn or
just something we don't know yet.
On our farm we get new dry corn in
on a monthly basis. We will know the
condition of that corn within days of
beginning to feed it. "Clean" tested
toxin free corn has been known to be
more of a problem than low level
toxins in corn. So there is lots that we
don't know yet. This is probably
overly simplified but the rest is for the
researchers and vets to figure out.
Have you ever vaccinated for
something and get it anyway? I
wonder why? Corn is only one small
area in this topic.
Protection and enhancement of a
pig's immune response to disease
challenge is a large area to research.
Some topics 1 would consider falling
under the term Protection would be:
• Studying the effects of stress,
environment and management on the
pig's ability to mount a defense to
disease challenge.
• How feed quality (particularly corn)
impacts on immune response.
• Related – finding compounds or
magic to allow us to feed poor quality
feed with limited effect on immune
function. (Have your cake and eat it
too.)
• Study different management
practices that could impair immune
systems.
• Study different breeding schemes to
determine if they have an effect on
immune system function. (Do fast-
growing, high -lean -type pigs resist
disease as well as slow fat ones?)
Some topics that would fall into
enhancing immune system function
would include:
• developing feed additives
(environmentally and consumer
friendly of course) that could sensitize
or hyperactivate.
• an immune system — just think of
the effectiveness a vaccine would
have.
• look for genetic solutions to this
problem (some research already
underway).
• other.
Other areas of research to follow
would be to study the effect on growth
and performance caused by an
enhanced immune system in a healthy
environment.
I would like to close with a word of
appreciation for those doing the
research. Your work is what gives us
our competitive advantage and can
forever change our ways of doing the
things we do. Thank you!0
– Submitted by Joe Kolkman
PERTH COUNTY PORK PRODUCERS'
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AVAILABLE FROM
Steve Hulshot (Kinkora) 348-8167
Martin van Bakel (Dublin) 345-2666
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Ted Keller (Mitchell) 348-9836
AUGUST 2001 61