Pigs 101 (A Start)

[thoongfoned]

some ways that you could try control-improve the cost of your farm animals would be. PSY. pigs sow year. if you run at anywere near 20 psy i would start here.  25 psy would be a good number, 28 better.555 you get the idea...

look at feed consumtion vs convertion. labor costs. electric bills. ect... if you have to finish the piglets try and work out the best time for you to sell, maybe 100kg is not the best average, some people like 60-70kg animals some 120-130kg, depends on time frame-cost for you to get to weight....

30 sows will not be cheap to maintain per year, say 30 to 35 bags  each of feed X baht.... plus all the sundries, thats why i started with psy...

 

[sateuk]

2 hours ago, thoongfoned said:

that pen size is plenty to put a small 30cm "c-pack" (cement) round feeder for the piglets, they only need to get their nose in to get a taste for the feed. these small feeders start at about 100 baht around the feed shops in the nearest market town to us.

try not to put the feeder under the nipple drinker......

Yes but won't the mum just eat it before they get a chance to?  Or when gone just push it with her nose all around the pen because I've not got a separate area for the babies

[sateuk]

4 hours ago, Robert24 said:

If you get 50 baht you are very lucky. Most people sell between 42-45 baht in Issan.

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We get 50 baht because it's a man from our village and it saves him going looking for pigs 20 kms away plus ours are normally 100 kg. Most Thais where I am sell at 60 -70 kilo coz they run out of money and that means he has to kill 2 a day so he gives us a few baht more.  Like I say if it goes below  50 will have to sell meat ourselves or stop doing it. 

[sateuk]

Be interesting to no the price at professional pig farms it was 60 baht in buriram don't no what it is now. I winder if anyone knows?  Thanks

[Robert24]

Be interesting to no the price at professional pig farms it was 60 baht in buriram don't no what it is now. I winder if anyone knows?  Thanks

CP announce their prices weekly on Buddha day and it is unchanged at 45 baht for Issan. That's usually for 100 pig+ if you work with CP. Most traders pay around CP -2 baht for 100 pig+. So smaller lots usually go for less than that. I spoke to one pig buyer 3 days ago and he is now buying between 40-42 baht in Sarakham. So if you can sell someone for 50 baht that is really great.

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[thoongfoned]

14 hours ago, sateuk said:

Yes but won't the mum just eat it before they get a chance to?  Or when gone just push it with her nose all around the pen because I've not got a separate area for the babies

yes sorry, didn t think the mum was 100% free movement.

[thoongfoned]

other ways that you could earn extra income from the pigs. sell-process the poo. we sell just sundried poo at 35-40 baht per bag. sell the back wash-pee water. we sell at  0.15 baht per litre. sell the old feed bags. make a biogas pit-balloon for running diesel engines or for cooking. the set up cost for this could out weigh the returns if you dont have enough pigs-methane. im sure there must be more but thats what we do, ahh the after birth, we used to sell this at 10baht a kg but at the moment we dont have a regular buyer in place. many people also like to eat the afterbirth, a friend of the wifes was here this morning for a bucket full from last nights 2 births...

[sateuk]

3 hours ago, thoongfoned said:

other ways that you could earn extra income from the pigs. sell-process the poo. we sell just sundried poo at 35-40 baht per bag. sell the back wash-pee water. we sell at  0.15 baht per litre. sell the old feed bags. make a biogas pit-balloon for running diesel engines or for cooking. the set up cost for this could out weigh the returns if you dont have enough pigs-methane. im sure there must be more but thats what we do, ahh the after birth, we used to sell this at 10baht a kg but at the moment we dont have a regular buyer in place. many people also like to eat the afterbirth, a friend of the wifes was here this morning for a bucket full from last nights 2 births...

We sell the bags but only 1 baht a bag.  Pig poo we get 30 baht a bag not got enough pigs just 20 mums.  Not got room to build anymore pig houses could possibly keep another 10 mums if built a small pig house but with the price at moment will wait and see.  Here they want the afterbirth for free!!  

[thoongfoned]

yes some people get the after birth free, but many give some thing back ie candy or drinks for the children. bags we only sell at rice harvest time, if they buy in the 1000's 3 baht each or if just in 100's 4 baht. the farm generates 5/7 bags of poo  after drying a day, tend to sell these by the 100 but at this time of years some veg grows will buy 5 or 10 bags. just had a regular poo customer in and he took all we had 500 plus bags, we tend not to sell any over the rainy season, so we had a back log, so to speak....555  rubber plantations,cane farmers and bamboo growers are the main bulk customers. people like the poo because it collected dry and then stored under cover.... 

we have people come and cut grass/weeds every day this time of year  for their cows, we have about 5/6 rai that just does nothing, just acts as an extra soak away when it rain all the time between the airations "ponds". i always say to wife wife why dont you ask anything in return, but she just tells me to stop being so tight.... every little helps i have learnt living here...

[IsaanAussie]

Can I suggest you put a fence across one corner of your nursery pens forming a triangular creep. The bottom rail being high enough for the piglets to walk under and put their feed bowl in there. The sow will not be able to get at it and the piglets will have somewhere to sleep away from the sow. 

[sateuk]

Yes a good idea got any pictures to give us an idea obviously made out of metal thanks

[thoongfoned]

talking with sister in law this morning, in the past week she has sold afew "finishers"  under 10 i think, she said the price was 39 baht a kg..... all bought on sight, ie no scales, from the amount she got, baht, i would say she got more than the quoted 39 baht kg.....

i think also from what she said that she has 3 sow that are not in pig, ie returns, i have never heard of her having a return before, they use the local stud boar. wife is going to go have a look....she did not look happy when we said those sows sounds like not in pig, she has lost 100 plus days already on these 3 sows. i said to her imagine if you were breeding 50 sows a month and you had loads return, think of the lost feed and down days... = baht....

back in october the wifes farm lost 1020 days in one month (31 days) due to returns- culling- gilts..... the worst i have seen production wise for her farm.

[thoongfoned]

On 30/11/2560 at 2:14 AM, jompa67 said:

The first 6 months this year was real bad with low birth and weaning rate. It looks like we will end up this year with "all time high". Look at the image from our farm-software. Even if we take into account that our worker have't remove lightweight piglets that died in the first days, its still a lot of piglet. To bad that the price is so low now.

jompa, how did you do with on the weaning numbers-kg on the above then?

had afew births this week in your league, 2 mums birthed alive 20 and 22 with average kg at 1.4 on both litters in the same day, have left all said pigs with mums as the other mums in same birthing time/ range are all 14/15 at the mo, on the same day as the 2 mums above had a gilt birth 10 mummified, 2 still born and what i call 5 not 100 perecnt, all out cold, total loss again!!! she was also an aggressive animal trying to bite the piglets.... said mum is in the cull pen waiting to exit the farm....

had higher than normal mummified piglets over the past 2 weeks, but again the same trend when there is mummified piglets the mums born alive stats are very high.... always like this over many years now.... at the time of AI it was not even hot either....for the past year we have been keeping records of morning and afternoon temp/weather conditions/windflow on fans ect.. in and outside farm, just another add on to the mountain of daily paper work for the farm. 

been out visiting some other farms in the area,  we have got some construction/improvement work about to start, and all have many heat lamps burning coz of the colder weather at the mo....

[sateuk]

Anyone no where can get the sperm from in buriram please as what we using at moment is taking a couple of tries before pregnant. Plus it quite expensive as well so looking to try elsewhere thanks

[jompa67]

On 1/12/2018 at 9:29 AM, thoongfoned said:

jompa, how did you do with on the weaning numbers-kg on the above then?

had afew births this week in your league, 2 mums birthed alive 20 and 22 with average kg at 1.4 on both litters in the same day, have left all said pigs with mums as the other mums in same birthing time/ range are all 14/15 at the mo, on the same day as the 2 mums above had a gilt birth 10 mummified, 2 still born and what i call 5 not 100 perecnt, all out cold, total loss again!!! she was also an aggressive animal trying to bite the piglets.... said mum is in the cull pen waiting to exit the farm....

had higher than normal mummified piglets over the past 2 weeks, but again the same trend when there is mummified piglets the mums born alive stats are very high.... always like this over many years now.... at the time of AI it was not even hot either....for the past year we have been keeping records of morning and afternoon temp/weather conditions/windflow on fans ect.. in and outside farm, just another add on to the mountain of daily paper work for the farm. 

been out visiting some other farms in the area,  we have got some construction/improvement work about to start, and all have many heat lamps burning coz of the colder weather at the mo....

 

We do not have statistics about kg after weaning . We'll start with it but as it looks now we do not. What I know is that those lightweight piglets need longer to reach the target weight. I would guess one week longer.

The average weaned is 11.81 piglets / litter during December month. We moved the small piglets to a foster sows and never had more piglets than the sow have nipples. We also practicing 2 step nursing, as I wrote about before.

We use to have mummified piglets as well, especially when they are gilts and have many piglets. It's not enough space in the belly plus they need more food than usual. When the number of mummified piglets are high as you describe, I would guess she had a sickness of some kind during early stage of pregnancy.

[thoongfoned]

11.81 is a very good average, gotta be happy with that!  if you look at the total born alive numbers though.... high death-mortality rate....

the mummified pigelts that we have been having have been  late term mummified ie full grown just  brown in the bag type.... its a pain in the arse to be honest, i expect the farm to loose 2-2.5 percent of births-piglets to this most years on average,  overall this year has not been a bad year for mummified piglets, its just when you group all the other little problems over the course of the year they soon add up..... thats how we have ended up with under 25psy last year.... the blood standard of the herd is all good going by the standards that the company set, we sit at the top of the table this wise  (blood tests every month) i think the problem is in the  larger herd ie grandparents,  great grandparents ect... and also the conditions in our farm, ie mainly heat stress... the little- very early term mummified are like you say just not enough room in the womb, to be expected as long as the percentages are low.  its not just are farm that has this sort of loss due to mummified its over many farms in many provinces from what im told, im very nosy and ask to many questions so the "boss" says.

anyway the farm ended last year with 2 good months of production, fingers crossed it continues...

[thoongfoned]

On 12/1/2561 at 11:36 AM, sateuk said:

Anyone no where can get the sperm from in buriram please as what we using at moment is taking a couple of tries before pregnant. Plus it quite expensive as well so looking to try elsewhere thanks

do you check each dose under a micro scope before using? the problem could the sperm is dead or near its "sell by date" if you are getting loads of returns.... 

try and look around on facebook for your area, for people producing/selling seamen. from what i can see on the wifes pages people seem to have most things related to/for pigs for sale on there. and plenty of people moaning about the live weight selling price....

[thoongfoned]

 thats a lot of returns..... with returns like that it will be impossible to get 30 psy.....  good  uniformed weaning kg though.555

[jompa67]

3 hours ago, thoongfoned said:

 thats a lot of returns..... with returns like that it will be impossible to get 30 psy.....  good  uniformed weaning kg though.555

I agree it looks little bit strange. It is the new insemination that counts as a failed insemination. Thanks for info, i will correct in the program.

[jompa67]

Whats is a correct definition on weaning? Is it the day when you move the sow or is it when you move the piglets away from farrowing?

[thoongfoned]

in your farm where you are the sole owner-boss i would say the day you move piglet away from the mum.

looking at your numbers above, the psy, i would say is on predict? reason: gestation days av say 115,  lactation days av 27, empty days ? 4/6 so say 5? = 147 days total av? AI to AI....  with no returns/abortion/culling day/gilt empty day or longer empty days that gives you 2.48 farrow per year. then look at the returns, say 50% will return in the first or near 21 days? 25/30% will return around 40/50 days, plus pigs that abort late term or NIP or are sick  ect...  then the cull animals, how many days waiting cull, gilts waiting for 1 service, extra foster days, the list does go on and on....

example of how the wifes farm will run: 114.5 av gestation 17 day lactation 5 day empty = 136.5 day. AI to AI that is a basic average. = 2.67 farrow year. but the true average would be around 2.45 on a very good month or 2.2 on a bad month depending on the above problems/empty days. in october last year the farm lost 1020 days! =  thats almost 92 bags of feed...... the average farrow that month was closer to 2.1. that is the worst i have seen for many a year....

 

your born alive numbers are very good! born alive average for the wife would normaly be 11/11.5 with weaning at 10.5/10.8.  approx 20% of mums will birth  alive under 10 again on average for us. i class a piglet of 1kg birth weight to be a loss, as we can not get it to weight in our time frame. crushing/death of piglet ect would be around/under 3% on a good month or 6/8% on bad months. during labour we tend to loose 8/12%  due to still born mummifed or not 100% class of piglet. with around 2% of total loss example; abortion,NIP late term,born mummified or not vaible.  if the farm was to wean 10.8 piglet average per year at 2.45 farrows (45 mum month) at conception rate of 88/90% i would be happy. that would give us around 5900 piglet from 220 working sows/gilts per year. best year to date has been close to 6400 piglet, last year was under 4900...... last year we only held average of 208 sow/gilts including non working... and the conception rate was around the 80% mark, very bad..  so this year praying for more luck/better results.555555

 

you tent to birth more females, just. we birth more males, average 3 males to 2 females

[thoongfoned]

add on; all the above numbers from the wifes farm come from month to month averages, then added up to the year. eg. the company up loads all are data daily, then come month end the computer works out all the psy, feed used ,sows/gilts in farm empty days/in pig days/weaning ect. this then works out with all the other bits that go into the workings of the farm. ie back fat measurements, bio security,  audit, kg, boy/girl wean, (every piglet is checked and has a value attacted to it, before piglets were assessed in bulk eg average kg/condition but now every one is either 100% or 80% or claim/reject / this then continues to the next farm where they have 5/7 days to reject/except out piglets. reject=  no payment for that piglet for us). the system is very clever, i have played on it in the office, i would say that this one program alone saves them many millions of baht every week... in paying the contract farmers.

so to work out the psy;  you would have to work out all the empty days in say a 1 month period against what you weaned, AI'ed/returns/ ect...empty gilt days, culling days from last weaning. (everything works off the last date of weaning), this way you collect all the empty days, then divide piglets with mums, days, then by year and you will get a true psy.

i used to work out the psy and would forget this empty day or that empty day, and by the end of it i would be way out from the true number..... some times by 100's or 1000's of days a year/month. on 220 sows/gilts its very easy to loose 500 days in a month....before i used to wear rose tinned glasses .55555

[sateuk]

On 1/14/2018 at 2:22 PM, thoongfoned said:

do you check each dose under a micro scope before using? the problem could the sperm is dead or near its "sell by date" if you are getting loads of returns.... 

try and look around on facebook for your area, for people producing/selling seamen. from what i can see on the wifes pages people seem to have most things related to/for pigs for sale on there. and plenty of people moaning about the live weight selling price....

Found a place now order before 10am get 4 pm we only 20 kms away so try do ourselves. Do you put 1 batch of sperm in evening then the 2nd batch in the morning?  If you do do you leave 2nd batch in fridge over night or do I just put both batches in at once thanks

[thoongfoned]

3 hours ago, sateuk said:

Found a place now order before 10am get 4 pm we only 20 kms away so try do ourselves. Do you put 1 batch of sperm in evening then the 2nd batch in the morning?  If you do do you leave 2nd batch in fridge over night or do I just put both batches in at once thanks

not really sure what you mean, do you buy the sperm in or are you collecting from one of your boars?

if you buy in, order morning get afternoon, ect. the dose should be fresh, how many "containers" are you get per order, say you can see one pig that will need service next day, 2 or 3 dose?  around 80ml in each dose? keep said sperm in fridge, ideal temp should be around 16/17c, fridge will need external termostate to get this temp all time... say you see the pig in full standing heat 01/02/61 am. do you do now? wait 12 hour? wait 24 hour? its up to you, do you keep past records of inseminations/results ect? if not try and start. for us most pigs will have a 12 hour wait after full standing heat detection, then AI, we average 2.4 inseminations per pig 50 of so pigs per month... the sperm if good and not exposed to sunlight and extreme heat or cold will/should be good for 3,4, even 5 days after collection/buying. always best to check under the microscope before each AI though. only do one dose per AI (80ml), idealy 12 hours apart. some pigs have long standing heats some sort, best results tend to come from AI earlyer rather then later in the cylce...

hope this ramble can be of some help...

[sateuk]

21 hours ago, thoongfoned said:

not really sure what you mean, do you buy the sperm in or are you collecting from one of your boars?

if you buy in, order morning get afternoon, ect. the dose should be fresh, how many "containers" are you get per order, say you can see one pig that will need service next day, 2 or 3 dose?  around 80ml in each dose? keep said sperm in fridge, ideal temp should be around 16/17c, fridge will need external termostate to get this temp all time... say you see the pig in full standing heat 01/02/61 am. do you do now? wait 12 hour? wait 24 hour? its up to you, do you keep past records of inseminations/results ect? if not try and start. for us most pigs will have a 12 hour wait after full standing heat detection, then AI, we average 2.4 inseminations per pig 50 of so pigs per month... the sperm if good and not exposed to sunlight and extreme heat or cold will/should be good for 3,4, even 5 days after collection/buying. always best to check under the microscope before each AI though. only do one dose per AI (80ml), idealy 12 hours apart. some pigs have long standing heats some sort, best results tend to come from AI earlyer rather then later in the cylce...

hope this ramble can be of some help...

Thanks we are ordering in will get the wife to check how many doses we are getting will put one dose then do again 12 hour later don't keep records but will start, as only got 20 sows so never bothered before. We are going to extend the farm to 30 sows so will keep proper records as you suggested which we should of done from start!! Thanks again

[thoongfoned]

20 sows is alot, the bills soon add up, by keeping records you might be able to see ways of saving money. records of in heats and lenght is very important, try and keep a record card with each sow/gilt plus  computer copy or just a book will do. always good to look back and see what been going on....when AI- ing dont be in a hurry take you time and let the sow suck all the sperm through in her own time, plus plenty of stimulation..... try and keep the hygene levels as best you can before and after AI. when its very hot its a good idea to shower the sow down an hour before AI, helps her to relax ect...

try and let the sows when waiting to come into heat and also during lactation have enough light, the increased light will help them come into heat quicker and will also help will milk yeilds. example. "they "say you should be able to read a news paper in the barn... 555 but you get the idea. 

[sateuk]

3 hours ago, thoongfoned said:

20 sows is alot, the bills soon add up, by keeping records you might be able to see ways of saving money. records of in heats and lenght is very important, try and keep a record card with each sow/gilt plus  computer copy or just a book will do. always good to look back and see what been going on....when AI- ing dont be in a hurry take you time and let the sow suck all the sperm through in her own time, plus plenty of stimulation..... try and keep the hygene levels as best you can before and after AI. when its very hot its a good idea to shower the sow down an hour before AI, helps her to relax ect...

try and let the sows when waiting to come into heat and also during lactation have enough light, the increased light will help them come into heat quicker and will also help will milk yeilds. example. "they "say you should be able to read a news paper in the barn... 555 but you get the idea. 

Yes I do thanks for the info

[revar]

got customer looking for 1200 piglets around 14+ kg at 1k a piglet.
800 on monday, 400 on friday.
preferably in khorat area, but not limited to that. pm if you are interested pls.

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[revar]

@sateuk
this is what i used when we didnt use farrowing cages.

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[revar]

cant attacf file. basicly i have one corner of the pen separated by verical iron bars. piglets can get in but sow cant.

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