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| I have good farrowing performance, currently. I don't wish to look for an excuse for poorer performance. Litter size is good, crushing % while pasture farrowing with no crush guards is good. I don't claim my wife is better than me at it, at all. I have higher skill, but she could (arguably) have a better gut instinct, in the moment. Or, perhaps not. I also wouldn't wholeheartedly subscribe to the notion that a male could learn all of the triggers to derive a good outcome. While that could be true, and a male highly skilled in animal husbandry could absolutely out compete a female not adept in animal husbandry, I would still argue a female could be able to "tap in" to the maternal instinct, to make better decisions on a case by case basis, on the fly. But, I could definitely be wrong in that argument. The "thinking they're fine in the gestation pen" is what really infuriates me in my operation. I check for "vulva flop", udder fill, yada yada. About the only surefire way to know they are somewhat close is getting milk, or nesting if they are within a day. But I've had one case where I got milk a week before farrowing, when everything seems to say milk is only available at something like 24-48hours prior to farrowing. My sows are tame, so I can check for milk in an open pen after feeding. Or conversely, their udders are only halfway full, and they farrow the next day. So even with natural breeding, it seems the best practice to look at when they were introduced to the boars, look at the farrowing calculator, and move them if they have even an inkling of being close. Most sync heat cycles with eachother and farrow pretty close to one another if they got bred during that cycle. | |
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Swine: A Study in Behavior
