FEED,HEALTH AND GROWTH OF PIGS.

Precision Livestock Farming is becoming very popular; many technologically driven companies are zooming into data-
collecting methods. Thus focusing on exact needs of the modern pig will allow producers to meet tomorrow's challenges, says Prof Sandra Edwards.“We cannot hope to improve the performance of today's pigs if we continue to rely on the nutritional, feeding and performance data we collected from (traditional) pigs a long time ago," says veteran UK pig researcher and scientist and chair of agriculture at the University of Newcastle, Prof Sandra Edwards. She argues that the type of pig that most commercial producers are working with at the moment is completely different to the animals on pig farms even a decade ago, when consumer demands were totally different.A whole new bank of research data reflecting the needs of the modern pig are urgently required to ensure progress by researchers in pig development on the scientific front. he says research had shown that producers needed to feed sows with arginine and glutamine supplements to help increase the placental quality, which reduced birth weight variation, as well as the number of under-weight piglets born alive.Recent work had also shown that including essential fatty acids such as docosahexanoic acid (DHA), which is found in algae and fish, in sow diets during the last month of their pregnancies led to a significant drop in the number of stillbirths. It also resulted in a longer farrowing duration. Feeding the sows to get their condition right before they go into the farrowing house and even before that. The pre-mating diet can have a big impact on embryo survival and high plane feeding before mating will help reduce embryo mortality. Sows should not be fed to produce bigger litters, but rather fed to meet the challenges of weaning more top quality piglets successfully. Read more ;http://www.pigprogress.net/Home/General/2014/1/Health-feed-growth--Nothing-happens-in-isolation-1392863W/?intcmp=related-content