Good
service facilities and staff are key to good service management which, in turn,
will help increase both farrowing rate and numbers born.
Well-designed
service areas help stockmen manage heat detection and artificial insemination
(AI) effectively. The service area should be nice and quiet and laid out in a
way that aids accurate heat detection and stimulation, without interference
from other sows.
It
can be more difficult to manage service on an outdoor unit, as batch systems
require more than 100 sows to be checked and served. So a producer in East
Anglia is trying out a newly developed ‘AI pod’ for outdoor units, as part of one
of our BPEX field trials.
The
pod has individual AI stalls for sows and gilts, on either side of the boar
pens. So far, it is helping sows stay calmer and it is much easier to
differentiate whether sows are showing standing heat or are not in heat, so it
should mean that timing of service is more accurate. We will know more soon about
its effects on numbers born.
For
more information on service management, download Action for Productivity
factsheets numbers 29, 30 and 31 from www.bpex.org.uk/2TS/breeding/
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