Keep litter mates together to reduce aggression and increase post-weaning weight gain.
Placing water drinkers apart and the use of bowl rather than bite drinkers will save water costs.
Provide multiple hanging chains in pig grower pens at weaning to reduce stress and injury
Take Home Message: Focus on pig genotype to improve growth rate and carcass composition with benefits due to vaccination dependent on herd health status
Genotype has the greatest influence on pig performance – in terms of growth rate and body composition – even when a vaccine against Porcine circovirus type 2 (PCV2) is used. In trials [...]
Rearing environment may affect the gut microbiota – and therefore the health – of pigs.
Different pig breeds respond differently in terms of fat deposition to the levels of nutrients supplied, particularly protein and energy.
Pork tenderness increases when pigs are grown relatively rapidly in the finishing period. But although fast growth will benefit tenderness, it won’t necessarily benefit meat odour or flavour.
Adding glycerol to pig rations significantly affected average daily liveweight gain but the effect was not linear.
Uniform grouping of pigs at weaning lowered the variation in weight between pigs at 11 and 15 weeks of age – and numerically at 20 weeks of age – compared with pigs in mixed weight groups from weaning.
Terminal sire breed has a significant effect on the fatty acid profile of pork.
