Tomás Ryan, Farm Manager at Teagasc Pig Research Facility gives an update on what has been happening on the farm during the first quarter of 2023.
He tells us about some of the key performance figures. Conception rate and farrowing rate are at 90% and 88% respectively for the first three months year to date. Production figures in the farrowing house are improving, born alive is up to 16, average birth weight is 1.5 and mortality is down to 13%. The three week batch system limits the cross fostering availability and the research element on the farm adds a component of mortality over a commercial unit.
At the end of lactation, piglets are weaning at 8.5kg which is up a little from last year, they are weaning 13.5 to 13.75 piglets per litter. Therefore weaning 115 - 120 kg per sow, which is a great improvement over the last few years. Tomás puts this gain down to the amount of creep feed piglets are consuming pre weaning, which has benefits for weight gain post weaning. They also wean intact litters which has benefits for the pigs post weaning too.
Tomás tells us they have made some changes to the breeding herd on the research farm, in the past they have always brought in replacement gilts, but have recently decided to start breeding their own replacement gilts. As a consequence the breeding herd has reduced down to 150 from 200 at the moment, in the next number of months they aim to bring this figure up again.
Source: EMM/ The Agriculture and Food Development Authority