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Wingham Advance-Times, 1977-10-19, Page 14nce-Times. October 19, 1977 WEANERS—These little cuties, now about six weeks, old, are in the weaner barn. Their next stop will be the fattening pens. • Sanitation essential to modern swine farming By Henry Hess The image off pigs is changing. It may not yet have reached the point where a mother will ex- claim approvingly over her off- spring: "Johnny, you're clean as a pig!" but a recent tour of a modern swine raising operation shows it is headed in that direction. The first indication of how serious today's pig farmer is about cleanliness comes when you are asked to don coveralls and boots before entering the barn. The boots are then rinsed in. a tray of disinfectant sitting near the door, If you have come from another farm, you must shower before entering the - barn; • a shower cubicle sits to one side of the anteroom at the .barn entrance. Wayne Fear, who has more than 2,000 pigs of all sizes on his farm in Morris Township, em- phasizes that sanitation is an integral part of pig farming. With a lot of pigstn close quarters, a farmer simply cannot afford to let disease enter the herd. The old image of a happy pig wallowing in reeking mire does- n't apply anymore. And the clean pigs look just as happy as any dirty ones could. Mr. Fear's barns, all built since he bought the farm in the spring of 1969, are designed to make it easy to be clean. Most of the pigs LITTLE PORKERS—Eleven tiny pigs and their mother lie in a metal slatted pen in the farrowing barn. Heat lamps help keep the little pigs warm. This will be their home for the first three weeks of their lives, at which age they are weaned and taken to the weaner barn while their mother returns to the dry sow" barn. are on slatted floors and the others are on sloped floors that drain to the back. The pens are effectively kept clean by the movement of the pigs themselves — less than half an hour a week is spent scraping manure, Mr. Fear said — and the wastes drain into a liquid manure tank for'spread- ing on the fields. Though no straw is used, the animals stay very clean and there is surprisingly little odor in the barns. A ventilation system prpvides fresh air to all the pigs. Cleanliness does not end with simply disposing of the wastes. Each month the farrowing and weaning pens are completely washed' and disinfected with a high pressure sprayer and the pens in. the fattening barns receive the same treatment twice a year. RECORDS ARE VITAL A large scale swine operation like the Fears' is run almost like a production line, and meticulous record-keeping is vital.,to keep it functioning smoothly. At the heart of the system are the 250 sows who produce the pigs. Each sow is represented by a pin in a large breeder wheel in Mr. Fear's office in one of his barns. The pins indicate when a sow was bred and 'when she is expected to farrow. Records are also kept of breed- ing details: ,his pigs are pre- dominantly Yorkshire, but there is some crossbreeding with Lan- drace and Duroc strains to develop certain attributes. A York-Landrace cross, Mr. Fear explained,has better mothering ability than the purebred York- shire, while a Duroc is meatier and a , better market pig. He practises some artificial in- semination, but mostly uses his own boars. • Records indicate, too, a sow's past production: How many pigs did -she wean in previous litters? A sow can produce 2.4 litters per year and has a breeding life of around five litters before the numbers start to decline,' Mr. Fear' said. He expects a sow to wean eight or nine good 'pigs and tries to get 20 pigs per sow each year. When she starts to taper off, she goes to market. One of the marks of a good pig is low back fat:0.55-0.75 inches in gilts (female pigs who have not yet mothered) and 0.5 inches or less in boars. This is one of the features taken into account in deciding whether to market a pig or keep it for breeding, Mr. Fear explained. • Back fat is measured by means of an electronic instrument about the size -of a CEI radio. He doesn't know how it works, he said, but it does. The same instrument, called a "pregnosticator", can indicate iAhether a sotv is "in • pig" about 40 days after breeding. PRODUCTION CYCLE The production cycle begins in the dry sow barn, where the bred sows and gilts spend their gesta- tion period. Most of them are kept in individual pens, although some are in communal pens along one wall. About a Week prior to farrow- ing, the sow is moved into a far- rowing crate in one of the four wings of the farrowing barn. Each wing has 14 crates and Mr. Fear practises "batch ffarrow- ing,", with all ,the sows in a, wing giving birth within three to four days of each other. This is pos- sible by timing the breeding ,and allows each wing to be washed and disinfected after the pigs are weaned and moved. out. Immediately following birth, each tiny pig has its needle teeth removed, its tail docked and, if a male and not selected ' for breeding, is castrated. It is also tatooed on the ear with its birth date. The needle teeth, Mr. Fear said, are eight small and extremely sharp teeth a pig is born with. He believes that in the natural process of things they acted to reduce litter sizes, since when the sow was bitten while suckling she became restless and tended to trample one or two of her offspring. In , order to increase the sow's. comfort and prevent, loss of valuable live - ,stock, they are now removed. The tail is docked because pigs get bored in confinement and tend to chew on each others tails, he added. This often leads to infection. As a substitute for tails, small chains are hung in the pens of some of the' younger pigs for them to play with.' Pigs are weaned at three weeks of age, at which time they are re- moved from the farrowing crate into pens in the weaner barn, while their mother goes back to the dry sow barn. • . The pigs will spend about five weeks in the weaner barn, where they receive special' feed, before being transferred to one of the fattening barns. . Many 'barrows (castrated males). are sold off ,as weaners weighing around 45 pounds, Mr. Fear said, but most gilts are raised to market weight of about 200 pounds, • at which ' time\ a decision is. made whether to keep them for breeding stock or sell them. A gat is ready for'breeding at 61/2-7 months, when she will Weigh close to 220 pounds. ' Pigs must . be .sold' almost-- im- mediately upon reaching market 'weight. "One thing you can't do is hold a pig too long," Mr. Fear noted, "because anything too heavy you get docked for." A farmer is paid according to the dressed weight of the pig, which will run between 150-180 pounds, and gets a lower price for anything over the set maximum. Market weight is going up to 200 pounds dressed in January, he. ,said, which will allow a farmer to fatten the pig a little longer. When they are. ready, pigs are • sent to the stockyards to be sold by the load to packing com- panies. Packers bid by the load and the price paid may vary up or down by several cents per pound. Sales are handled through the pork marketing board, which then averages the prices paid over a week and pays that to the farmers. This means all farmers, selling pigs at the stockyard that week get the same price for their animals, whether it was a "good" or a "bad" day. Mr. Fear fattens around 3,000 pigs per year at the present time • ansk atsu'-sells pigs to other farmers for use as breeding stock. EXPANDING OPERATION Mr. and Mrs. Fear started their present operation eight years ago last spring. They had farmed before, but not on the same scale, and he had also held a second job working in the Goderich salt mines. w They started out using the barn that was on the property, gradually building new ones as they expanded. Last year they tore down the old barn and their facilities are now all new. Beginning with 30 sows in 1969, they had 100 in 1976, now have 250, and are working up ' to a ceiling of 280. Mr. Fear explained he has farrowing facilities for 280 sows and plans to be getting full use of them next year, though he does not plan any immediate ex-. pansion of the fattening program. Up until this year, he said, he did all the barn work himself and only employed field help at seeding and harvest time. Now he employs two men full-time, one as a herdsman.to work excllusive- ly in the barns: He grows all his own feed on the 490 acres, he added, including 300 acres of corn and 75 of barley. He also grows some hay for sale. The basis of his feeding system is high moisture corn: harvested "and shelled'before it is complete- ly dry and stored in silos. It is then ground and mixed with barley ° and concentrate for feeding to the pigs. A Farmatic feed system allows mixing in exact proportions for pigs at different stages off fattening. Feeding is still quite labor inten- sive, since it is difficult to automate a system using high moisture corn, he said: the moisture content keeps the feed from flowing smoothly. OPTIMISTIC ABOUT FUTURE Pig marketing is good now and has been for the past three years, Mr. Fear noted, but declined to predict how long this might last. Next year could be a different story, he admitted. The good market conditions of the past several years have encouraged many farmers to turn to swine and "everybody's building barns now", he said, adding that, as With other types of farming, the cost of production is going up faster than the price of the product. While there is a marketing board, he thinks it is restricted to handling sales and promoting the use of pork and doesn't have any direct influence on price levels. Nevertheless, even with the fluctuating market, he isoptim- istic he can continue to operate and make a profit, hoping eventually to completely pay off his farm. RECORD WHEEL—Each pin in this wheel represents one of. Wayne • Fear's 250 sows. The wheel helps him keep track of when each was bred and when she is expected to farrow; Bookkeeping is an important part 'of a modern pig -raising operation and, by checking his records, Mr. Fear can tell what type of boar each sow pas bred to and how many pigs she had in previous litters. ' FATTENING—After leaving the weaner barn, pigs are fattened to market weight in these pens in the fattening barn. They start out with about seven square feet per pig and are thinned out to provide about 13 square feet each as they grow bigger. GILTS—The gilts (female pigs who haven't yet farrowed) in this pen, are about five months old, are being kept for breeding. They will be ready to breed at 61/2 to seven months, at which time they will weigh about 220 pounds. Only the best are kept for breeding; the others are marketed. We Tell You Sell COSSROA©S 357-2320 DRY SOW BARN—These sows have been bred and are now being kept in pens in the dry sow barn until shortly before farrowing. A sow can have 2.4 litters per year and her breeding life is about five litters. When the size of the litters starts to decrease the sow is shipped off to market. LOTS OF PIGS—The interconnected barns on the Wayne Fear farm in Morris Township house more than 2,000 pigs at all stages of growth, from tiny newborn squealers to huge sows. Mr. Fear has been in the pig business in a big way since buying this farm 'in 1969, gradually enlarging and building new barns. He started with 30 sows, now has 250, and is working up to his farrowing capacity of 280. ?l*+.�9,�r,!'L.' 1'•;•"'L.; save wa+. FEED SYSTEM—A Farmatic feed system custom grinds and mixes feed for all the various sizes and ages of pigs. Dials on the machine let the operator set the amounts of corn, barley and concentrate in each batch of feed. Much of the feeding Is done by hand as the relatively wet feed which results from using high moisture corn Is hard to handle automatically, Wayne Fear explained. uc;