Drinker design key to minimising waste, but not pig performance
How water is supplied to growing pigs has no effect on their performance, but it can make a difference when it comes to waste and slurry volume – up to an additional 32 tanker loads, according to a trial recently completed at Hillsborough’s Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute and led by Elizabeth Magowan.
“Neither drinker design or position had any effect on pig performance. However, significantly more water was used with the Halfman Bite and Jalmarsen Bite Ball drinkers compared to the Drik-O-Mat Bowl and Verba Nipple drinkers we used in the trial,” she told delegates at this year’s British Society of Animal Science annual conference.
Inadequate water intake is associated with reduced feed intake, poor daily gain, poor feed conversion, scour problems and lower digestibility of feed in pigs. And factors that can reduce water intake include contamination, high mineral content of water, low temperature, low flow rate from drinker, too few drinkers or poor drinker/nipple position. “But there is a lack of information on the effect of drinker design on water intake and performance,” said Dr Magowan.
“Three designs of drinker commonly used are nipple drinkers, bite drinkers and bowl drinkers. And the aim of our study was to investigate the effect of drinker design and position on performance and water usage of growing pigs,” she added.
A total of 720 pigs were split into groups of 20 and randomly allocated to one of six treatments. Two drinkers were placed in each pen of 20 pigs. Pigs were offered water from four drinker designs, two of which were in different positions. Daily feed intake, daily live weight gain, feed conversion ratio and water usage were determined from weaning to seven and 10 weeks of age.
“And we found that the design or position of drinker had no effect on growth performance, feed intake or feed conversion efficiency of pigs,” said Dr Magowan.
Flow rates were measured as 250ml/minute, 600ml/minute, 700ml/minute and 1,200ml/minute for the Drik-O-Mat bowl, Verba Nipple, Halfman Bite and Jalmarsen Bite Ball drinkers respectively. Compared to the Drik-O-Mat bowl and Verba nipple drinkers, water usage tended to increase from four to 10 weeks of age, when the Halfman bite drinker was used and was significantly greater when the Bite Ball drinker was used.
“It is likely that the majority of the extra water used was wasted and, therefore, potentially increased slurry volume, resulting in an additional 17 and 32 tanker loads (6.82 m3) of slurry produced per year on a 200-sow unit using either the Halfman Bite or Jalmarsen Bite Ball drinkers respectively,” added Dr Magowan. “And this would have major implications on the dry matter of slurry and slurry storage requirements on pig farms.”
Presented to the British Society of Animal Science Annual Meeting, March 31 to April 2, 2008, Scarborough, UK.
Magowan E and McCann MEE: “The effect of drinker design and position on water usage and performance of growing pigs.” Proceedings of the British Society of Animal Science, pp15 http://www.bsas.org.uk/Publications/Annual_Conference_Proceedings
PDF of Powerpoint presentations available at http://www.bsas.org.uk/Members_Area/
summary (pdf) Presentation_015magowan (pdf)
