Pigs 101 (A Start)

[jompa67]

Embryos can be a problem. You have two choices:

1. Let them stay in individual pen for the first 30 days. Because of stress, you will have increased "Return to heat" when they are moved together.

2. Create a group before they get inseminated, so rank can be set. Best is if you could move sows after weaning direct to a group room, all at once. Then they have time to form a rank/hierarchy.

[Allgeier]

jompa 67:

How you make it?

I will try to have individual pen inside the group room.And after inseminetad i will put the sow inside a pen for 21 days.

The sow stay inside the pen and also in the room with the another sow and is also protected in the first 21 Days. And i hope there is after not a to big fighting.

[jompa67]

How you make it?

Just put them together before insemination so a social order can be established. After that, there will be no fighting and no stress. If you feed them to little they may start to fight.

[Allgeier]

jompa 67:

In your opinion it is necessary to put individual pen inside the group room or not?

[IsaanAussie]

jompa 67:

In your opinion it is necessary to put individual pen inside the group room or not?

I tried this by building individual feeding stalls in one grouped sow pen, four sows. I showed that layout some years ago on this forum. What I found was the sows tended to spend a lot of time sleeping in their stalls so they obviously felt "safe" lying together separated by those barriers. But it made it more difficult to clean the pen and in my opinion did not make a difference to behaviour patterns. They still went through the normal hierarchy establishment period of a day or two at the start. So I removed the dividers.

I had five group sow pens each with four sows. They were naturally bred in those pens and gestated full term together moving each into a nursery pen to farrow and then nurse and wean their piglets. I never lost a litter because of this grouping arrangement.

So based on my experience, I would say no, it is not necessary to have individual pens.

Edited December 29, 2015 by IsaanAussie

[nutterz64]

With this vaccine programs for piglets, it is important that sow is vaccinated in the right time so that antibodies is transfer to the piglets when they are drinking the milk.

Great info Jompa. What software are you using? I am a bit tired of my clunky spreadsheets that I designed myself and am looking for something more friendly and useful.

By the way all, My apologies for being so quiet on the forum this year. Have spent 80% of my time back in Oz working but now back to my home in Thailand and looking to expand our farrow to finish operation in the early part of the year. Going to be very busy researching room design and operating efficiencies before I lay the slab. Have recently completed earthworks giving us a new dam, settlement pond a long way from the sheds and a raised building platform for the new finishing rooms. Once complete I have to redesign the current barn which was set up to house the whole farrow to finish operation which is not ideal.

I am still struggling with the decision of using traditional gestation stalls and farrowing rooms or trying to accommodate sows in open stalls. Even looking at group housing. Budget and space constraints will probably dictate the final result. However the information being shared here is invaluable so I thank all members for their unselfish contributions of experience and photos.

Anyway.

Sawadee Pee Mai to all. May 2016 bring us health happiness and harmony.

Peter

P.S. I would love to organize a social get together in the new year for members here. Especially those located near Udon Thani. I'm thinking about meting in Udon rather than tramping all over each others farms or perhaps even at our house which is located 3 km from the farm. Let me know what your thoughts are.

[jompa67]

jompa 67:

In your opinion it is necessary to put individual pen inside the group room or not?

I don't know. I have never try. Sorry for a short answer.

The recommendation from internet and videos is to inseminate in individual pen and keep them there for about 28 day. Then move them to a group room.

Here is a page with 4 short videos on group housing and the benefits. Tell me what you think. What can be improved so it works down here in a warm climate.

Happy new year 2 u all

[jompa67]

With this vaccine programs for piglets, it is important that sow is vaccinated in the right time so that antibodies is transfer to the piglets when they are drinking the milk.

Great info Jompa. What software are you using? I am a bit tired of my clunky spreadsheets that I designed myself and am looking for something more friendly and useful.

The PC version can be download from here. If you have an Android phone, you can download an app that you use when you are on the farm.

And ofc, there is no manual, sorry for that.

Edited December 31, 2015 by jompa67

[Allgeier]

Here a answer to this 4 videos.

- No individual pen for feeding

- feeding on the floor

Not easy to explane but when i look this video i can see a big differant.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dcr53thaHcU

Its in german but the video should explane by them self.

There use individual pen and nobody feeding on the floor.

In my situation i think its will be good to have individual pen insite the group room. Because i would like to have only 6 or 8 sow. And i not like to move them out from the group. The birthplace should be also close to the group room. So the sow's stay in contact and its maybe easier to bring the sow back after birth.

Maybe. In a 1/2 year i will know the answer. If i weld the cage by my self i think its would not to be to expensive.

Normaly i like there stay with straw. But if there feel hot maybe there piss insite the straw to cool them down. Maybe.

- Sprinkler

- Bath

- Straw

- Individual pen for feeding and inseminate and keep them after there for 21 Days ( or more)

- Birthplace close to the grouproom

- feeding 5 - 8 times the day ( But who will do this and have time)

- dividers

[Allgeier]

Last week i bought some "broken rice" to feed to the pig and now i must see that the whole grain come out and stay insite the feces..

Now its my question if the pig with about 60 kg can collect the nutrions from the ricegrain or not. Because i not have a mill to make a powder from the grain.

[jompa67]

We use broken rice from 12 kg and up. But ofc, if you can make it smaller, you will have better digestive.

Here is a link to our Facebook showing how to mix with broken rice and Ramm.

[revar]

Mixed feelings from our farm. Last 3 week births were all under 8 piglets.

After a lot of checking iv found out that the fridge for overnight semen storage was unreliable. Since i get the semen fresh, ai once and do the next the next morning we might have 3-4 months of low births comming. For now i buy one tube and just drive again the next day.

On the positive side. 3 weeks after weaning the pigs are 95+ kg, no fat. Company vet came to check them, saw them called contacts and now they will be exported to china in two weeks at 120ish or higher kg.

Minimal price of 62/kg agreed upon. Higher if market goes up. Partial payment in advance at 110 kg.

If someone in the dankhuntod - khorat area is interested in similar deals let me know. They are looking for regular producers of 100+ 120kg pigs, but 2 with 50 will be fine too. High quality needed and you will need to use their food. But a guaranteed buyer at reasonable prices.

And theyvwant 120kg pigs. The 20 extra kg means an extra profit of 500 bath a pig.

[revar]

Export pigs

[Robert24]

Mixed feelings from our farm. Last 3 week births were all under 8 piglets.

After a lot of checking iv found out that the fridge for overnight semen storage was unreliable. Since i get the semen fresh, ai once and do the next the next morning we might have 3-4 months of low births comming. For now i buy one tube and just drive again the next day.

On the positive side. 3 weeks after weaning the pigs are 95+ kg, no fat. Company vet came to check them, saw them called contacts and now they will be exported to china in two weeks at 120ish or higher kg.

Minimal price of 62/kg agreed upon. Higher if market goes up. Partial payment in advance at 110 kg.

If someone in the dankhuntod - khorat area is interested in similar deals let me know. They are looking for regular producers of 100+ 120kg pigs, but 2 with 50 will be fine too. High quality needed and you will need to use their food. But a guaranteed buyer at reasonable prices.

And theyvwant 120kg pigs. The 20 extra kg means an extra profit of 500 bath a pig.

just out of interest, can you provide a bit more detail about the company you work with? I.e. What min/max lots they need for export, what price do you have to pay for food, is the price is you sell pigs to them linked to the published CP price, I.e. CP - 2 baht or something like this, and would you be able to share the name of the company? Just asking because I work with CP right now, similar deal I buy food from them and can sell back pigs at CP price.it's an ok deal but their food is a bit on the pricey side hence always looking what other options are out there.

[jompa67]

New batch of piglets just sold.

[thoongfoned]

New batch of piglets just sold.

looking good, how many day old?

[ChiangMaiPigFarmer]

Hi to all. Busy and not on here as much as I should be. Sorry.

I am looking to source piglets or pigs for finishing in the north of Thailand especially around Udon Thani. Will pay market price if the piglet and sow are feed commercial feed and are from a pedigree line or good quality line.

Thanks,

Randall

[email protected]

[jompa67]

New batch of piglets just sold.

looking good, how many day old?

From 30 days up to 40 days. The piglets weighing from 7 kg up to 11 kg with an average weight of 9 kg.

[jompa67]

Learn to understand your pigs: https://youtu.be/QIMmxt-YbE8

[thoongfoned]

some good info there jompa, I have always wondered about the pigs eye sight, now I know.

bloody cold up around udon thani at the mo, just shows how you get used to the humid weather, the mums are a grumpy lot too when the weather is like this,

don't like the night time runs into the farm but have been on this buzz for awhile now coz of the drop in temp, helps with the birthing alive numbers, even leaving loads

of light bulbs on will not help all the new born piglets, gotta be hands on or you will loose many this time of year...

the mums have been producing well the past 2 months, wean tomorrow and that makes this month just over the 650, finished for that month. that's from 55 mums, could have

topped 12 per mum weaned but had a couple of "bad" mums that almost lost or killed their litters. had another mum sit on a 8 kg piglet this morning too, would have been weaned

tomorrow........ still sister law was happy to grill it up for breakfast......

in the past few days I have seen the mums returning into heat a day or so slower than the norm, I also put this down to them being cold and not that happy... been averaging 20.4

days back "into pig" for a couple of months now, that's on more that 55 AI every month, very quick..........

[weegee]

To all the Pig Farmers.....

Thought this post was the best place to get a reply reasonably quickly...Does anyone know where 'Pigeon Jake" is?...is he ok?...I have sent him a PM a while back to check, and havent had a reply.

I haven't seen him posting either.

That's not like him, and i am concerned....Please PM me or reply here if you know he is ok.

Thanks

weegee

[stoneyboy]

To all the Pig Farmers.....

Thought this post was the best place to get a reply reasonably quickly...Does anyone know where 'Pigeon Jake" is?...is he ok?...I have sent him a PM a while back to check, and havent had a reply.

I haven't seen him posting either.

That's not like him, and i am concerned....Please PM me or reply here if you know he is ok.

Thanks

weegee

I can't confirm if he is well or not but can confirm that he often works overseas and maybe somewhere that isn't served by Internet or just doesn't have the time,especially if in Africa.

[pigeonjake]

I'm here.

Just sent you a pm. I've been in Oman I'm in the UK at the moment seeing family.

All's well at the farm the wife even sold one pig in a day the other week. All the veg is growing like mad after all the poo its had on it over the years. I just haven't been on here for ages.

To many Google experts trying to tell you how to farm here in Thailand they don't think we have been doing it for years not for months.

We have made most of the mistakes they are preaching about. So it was time for me to give TV a rest.

I wish all the new comers good luck, it is hard to farm in Thailand but it can be done and its great fun

Jake

[thoongfoned]

dead on here so I will write some stuff...

farm has been busy the last working month, finish today, birthing wise, one mum just starting now. (unless we have an early birth) all being well we will just fall short of 500 weaned piglets,

(barring loads of deaths ect..) from 43 mum. been getting alot in the teens birthing wise apart from yesterday when we had an 8 and then an 11. a lot of the mums have been birthing round

113.5 days for awhile now, I think this is due to the cold weather and larger litter numbers. on average the mums would birth on 114.5 days. very rare these months to see a mum go past 115 days.

still struggling with the wean weight, really trying to get the average on the 6kg mark at day 19 but are still falling short by 200g or so most months. always have say 2 mums out of ten that have

milk that is not that good, these always bring the average down. like yesterday I took a litter away from a mum that all of a sudden the milk has gone bad, well that's what I think anyway. she

was nursing 14 good looking piglets for 4 days, then the next day 3 dead, showing signs of pooing and lacking milk... this is a parity 11 mum, very big pig, never had a problem with the milk before....

she is back in the AI area now. got another mum parity 10 or 11 for the past 5 litters her milk has been bad, she is nursing all her born alive piglets (16) they look ok, nothing special but alive, she is

on day 6 I think now..... AI work seems to have improved over the last 4 or so months, the worst percentage wise over this period as been 90 ish percent with baby so this is good, my goal is to maintain

90 percent over the year (well we have been trying for this for a few years 55555) adding the extra lighting in august seems to have paid off and the changing of the time we AI too. only time will tell

once the warmer weather returns. sept through till now ish is usually a good AI time for birthing numbers, ie cooler when you do the AI work, always say to the "boss" judge the farm on a full years

work basis..... had a visit the other day from the local boss regarding the farms last months work, very happy with the numbers he was (so will I be when we get paid) the best I have seen since starting

PSY wise, the company work this out every month, part of the farms pay structure, hit just over the 28 per mum, and that's working on their figures, my figures always tend to be a little more "rose tinted"

then the "true company ones" so very happy and surprised we were to see this in black and white.

very cold last night, it sure "sorts" out the weaker piglets (die) this weather, loads of light bulbs on in the farm at all times at the mo (electric meter is spinning well) lucky we did not have an early birth

last night, 2 births in the next 2 days is what the paper work says then back to 3 and 4 per day for a week or so, hope the weather turns back to being a litter warmer by then..........

[thoongfoned]

ended up with 5 births yesterday. days old: 1x115 1x114 3x113....... all being well should hit the 550 weaned..............

[snowandpigs]

hi , yes your sure right of importance of plenty of heat for piglets ,, even when get a little older before weaning ,,bandung at the moment have had some chilly lows in nights,,, have 30 sow setup and glad to chat to like minded farangs in same business,,, regards chris

[thoongfoned]

yep during the night we are leaving a 100 watt light on for even 10 -12 day old piglets, mum birthing now has 300 watt of light on the new born, have lights set up for both side of the mum for when the

piglets are drinking milk for the first half of the first day too. gonna love the electric bill this month.

over the past few months we have added a sort of weaning area for the piglets, we take the piglet at approx day 15 from the mum then let them eat for a few days before they go onto the next farm at day

19 ish. we have gone for c-pac flooring, seems to work well, they have a little area to eat and drink in, I can see that the piglets eat more here as before we left them in the farrow box with food ect... they

tend to play a lot more with the water, hence the food goes more like a soup. day 15 they tend not to gain weight but after the first day even the smallest piglets will be gaining 200g. we have had added

a heat box to the "weaning area" where at the mo we leave a light on for them, they still pile up on top of each other though. in the weaning area we can hold 100 plus piglets,(not all in one box) it also helps

to free up the farrowing boxes when we are very busy.

I had the pleasure of being in the farm at 2am this morning it was just below 50f, now its just over 70. got one mum almost finished, she has 17 and another has just popped 2 out and does not look very

happy to me..........

[thoongfoned]

great shot I know....... mum just out, she birthed 17 alive, have moved 2 from her to new mum just started out also.

we have 20 mums under lights as I write. ( not all as many as this though)

[Allgeier]

Last week i bought 7 piglet. 1200 bath each. Very noughty. Like to eat my feet.

My sow will give birth in about 2 weeks. This will be the quarter of the year highlight.

Edited February 10, 2016 by Allgeier

[snowandpigs]

hi,, would like to do new general forum post with attachments ,, anyone help with what steps need to go through,, only can see reply this topic ,or direct message to members in messages,,,,cheers