Weighing up feed use
With feed accounting for the major cost of producing pigs, UK pig farmers are cottoning-on to the benefits of monitoring feed use at source— the feed bin itself.
| Pig & Poultry
T im Miller, environmental specialist with Staffordshirebased ARM Buildings, says load-cells have been installed under feed bins on a number of units. Linked to the Dicam monitoring system – which the company supplies free for the first 12 months with all new buildings— they provide a continuous and accurate check on feed consumption.
The system will also provide a very important early warning of any glitches in the feed supply
“ If the bin is tared when empty, the producer knows exactly the weight of feed within it after a delivery. He can see on the farm’ s computer how much feed the pigs are eating on a daily basis, so can work out how much a particular batch of pigs has consumed, enabling true feed conversion figures to be worked out,” said Tim.
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“ Farmers have also found it helpful to use monitoring to plan feed deliveries. The days of frantic phone calls to get a load before a holiday period are long gone as are those of having to go out and hit the side of the feed bins to guess the amount of feed remaining, are typical comments
I’ ve received from farmers using this system,” said Tim.
The system will also provide a very important early warning of any glitches in the feed supply, such as bridging in the bin, when no feed is being delivered despite the motor running. In addition, a drop in consumption can indicate a potential health problem with the pigs not eating as they should, he added.
The buildings need standard broadband connection, but if this is not available then a cellular connection can be installed.
St David’ s branches into antibiotic reduction in pigs
Pig producers could reduce antibiotic usage and improve animal health and productivity by adopting a new approach piloted by the poultry industry.
F ollowing tremendous success helping poultry producers to reduce antibiotic usage, St David’ s veterinary team is now branching into the pig sector. The initiative, which will be launched at the British Pig & Poultry Fair, is based on improving the animals’ natural health through a combination of probiotics, organic acids and water sanitation.
“ We have spent many years pulling together the latest research and industry best practice from around the world,” says partner Richard Turner.“ Working with the large integrators we have put this into place on a number of poultry farms, with considerable success, and are now rolling it out to the pig sector.”
Antibiotic resistance is a huge threat to human health, and livestock farmers are under increasing pressure to stop using antibiotics altogether.“ As a practice we started looking at antibiotic reduction 10 years ago, and now more than 40 % of medicines we use to treat infections are not antibiotics,” says Mr Turner.“ There will always be situations where we have to treat with antibiotics, but in this country there hasn’ t been enough time spent looking at alternative approaches.”
Amazingly, animals’ bodies comprise 90 % bacteria – in effect people are only made up of 10 % human cells. Through its Applied
Bacterial Control( ABC) programme, St David’ s looks closely at all husbandry factors that influence this microbiome, and develops a bespoke strategy to boost natural gut health and reduce the need for routine antibiotic treatments.
Central to the ABC system is clean water and the Seed, Weed and Feed approach, developed by Professor Stephen Collett from the University of Georgia, USA. This involves seeding the gut with beneficial flora, feeding them by creating the right gut environment, and weeding out unfavourable microbes.
“ Bacteria pass down from one generation to the next, so best results involve treating parent stock as well as youngsters on arrival at the farm,” says Mr Turner.“ In the poultry sector adopting such a proactive approach to bird health has helped our clients to significantly improve production efficiencies, and we are now looking forward to helping pig producers do the same.”
May 2016 | Farming Monthly | 13