Aggressive Gilt Advise

Breeding questions, sow talk, semen management, baby pig basics
BigRed
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Aggressive Gilt Advise

Post by BigRed » Mon Jan 11, 2010 9:29 am

Had a gilt farrow this weekend she had six, killed 3, tried to bite me and a buddy helping. The babies did nurse a little while she was laying down laboring. She was way to aggressive so we put the orphans on another sow without problems. We pen farrow, and have never really had this problem before.
Question:
Would you guys cull her or try again in a crate?
Any other suggestions?

Thanks.

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Post by XHOG » Mon Jan 11, 2010 11:21 am

Big Red,
I think I would try her again in a crate if you really like her and is of some value to you. Sometime with gilts the are aggressive during the labor period and maybe a short time after. Typically they stop that stuff and accept the babies.
We have had them bite at us and bite and kill the little ones and we just try to keep them away from their mouth until after farrow.
Did you leave the little ones with the mother any time after piggin'?

Good luck.

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Post by BigRed » Mon Jan 11, 2010 12:48 pm

no we moved them to another sow. she was the champion gilt at our county fair this past year so i would like to get a few litters out of her. I think i am going to try an off season breeding and let her farrow in a crate.

I have also heard of sedating the sow while farrowing? does anybody have any experience with this?

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Post by patch » Mon Jan 11, 2010 1:06 pm

We had a gilt/sow that we farrowed 4 times and she would try to kill her pigs each time. After she finished labor and cleaned out, she was fine and took good care of them, but not till then.

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Post by KMW » Mon Jan 11, 2010 2:28 pm

ive had this happen before. if i have an agressive sow ore gilt, i usually just pull the pigs off the sow until she is done farrowing. i put them in a basket with i heat lamp over it. when she is done and settles down, then i put the pigs back on and watch her closely for a couple of hours. i havent had any problems with this method. usually once she settles down, she is fine with them and doesnt try to kill them anymore.

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Post by XHOG » Mon Jan 11, 2010 3:40 pm

You guts are right on. Get it all over with, drink a beer and put them back on momma and after all the business is done hopefully they get down to doing their job and milk.

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Post by Ericka » Mon Jan 11, 2010 7:53 pm

My two gilts were a little crazy during and for a little while after birth. One actually tried to get a baby when it made noise. I had to keep them locked up and would let them out ever 45 min or so to nurse. They both got over it by the next morning and they were the best moms in the world. I was ready to load them up and send them to the great pig pen in the sky. Thank god I didn't because I can't wait to rebreed them. They both weaned out the full litter. If I have trouble with our other gilt that is due next month I will try the duct tape method. I have read alot of people using it. Do a search to find the previous posts. Good luck to you.

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Post by johnnysow » Mon Jan 11, 2010 9:41 pm

We use the duct tape .have had gilts go nuts bite you and the babys we give them to start with 2 cc of ace then i give them 3cc whiskey in there ear sounds crazy but it works,that will take the edge off. have given all the way up to 7 cc of ace on one really big gilt before she would lay down. take about six good raps of duct tape leave there snout open they will drink. have had to tie them in the crate once they lay down. just tie there bottom leg to the rail in the crate . by morning they will be fine at leased ours have been, still have all of the one that we have had problems with . second time around they were all fine.

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pig savaging

Post by oldobserver » Tue Jan 12, 2010 12:49 am

when this happened to us the first time it was a pen farrowing because we had the wrong breeding date on a purchased bred gilt. she started in a pen and killed the first 6 born. got her in a crate and she farrowed 7 more. tried to get them all while she was farrowing so we would just let them nurse colostrum and then put them in a box. when she was done she killed one more - of course it was the biggest and best one - so that was the straw that broke the camel's back. we did 2 more days of putting them with her and taking them off and each time she would try to get them if they got anywhere close to her head. in that 2 day span i read all the research i could find on it on the internet. there is quite a bit there with interesting statistical data. we raised the remaining six on bottles and sent her to butcher. the next one savaged hers when they were 10 days old and killed 5 of 9 big healthy fat babies. she got the same treatment. the first one was mean and grumpy the whole time she was pregnant but the other was a show gilt that loved being brushed and scratched.
i dont have any answers for you and lots of people have offered advice of what to do. i suggest you read the research and study the data and see what it says. this is a problem that may have many causes. one of which may the fact that selection for maternal instincts is something that has fallen out of favor to be replaced by trying to breed the next best thing for the showring. large commercial operators that i have personally asked this report only limited occurances while it is mentioned many times on this forum.
we farrow mostly former show gilts and some are excellent mothers but the sight of dead and destroyed baby pigs in a farrowing crate still haunts me. i would not give one a second chance to do that again. it would like a death sentence for those little innocents. others will disagree for certain but that is my two cents and that is all its worth. (and maybe not even worth that much)
good luck with your decisions and all the home remedies offered here but ask yourself if this is a natural thing for a sow to do. i dont think so. cull her.
To see the light at the end of the tunnel, sometimes you must stride down there and light the damn thing yourself!

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Post by BigRed » Tue Jan 12, 2010 9:12 am

Just curious what breeds have you guys experienced this with.
Ours was a Duroc.
Our Berk and Cross which is 2/3 york were great my oldest kid was in the pen and helped without any problems.

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Post by johnnysow » Tue Jan 12, 2010 10:44 am

Ours where all cross breeds usally the younger ones. WE just farrowed our first two durocks and they did just fine. One litter is a week old and she has 13 on her, had them all on her own every body is good. We also use a rubber mat that we have cut with a notch in it ,it slides under the bottom bar on the crate and behind her front legs,and over to the side of the crate keeps the babys a way from her head and blocks her view helps keep her calm.

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Post by jlhogs » Tue Jan 12, 2010 11:15 am

johnnysow-the rubber mat sounds like a great idea. It sounds easier then having to keep running to the front of the crate to move the babies from near her head.
We farrow mostly durocs and never had a problem, we just keep the babies away from their head until the sow/gilt has passed the afterbirth.

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Post by johnnysow » Tue Jan 12, 2010 12:22 pm

We use rubber mates on wire in the crates and the piece that we cut of the side to make it fite right is the piece we use works good Its a bout 14 inches high by 4 foot long it will slide right under the bar and wrap around down the side. If the sow / gilt doesnt get up your not chaceing them around the crate. We keep a platic tub with towels and heat lamp in reach because most of the time they will jump up once or twice when they have a good labor pain till they have four or five then they seam to calm down.

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Post by bren » Wed Jan 13, 2010 3:07 am

I like that rubber mat idea. Sounds good.

I had a gilt farrow about 4 weeks ago. ( in a crate )

She had 12 pigs in 90 minutes. The first 3 were born about 15 mins apart and then she spit the rest out like popcorn! During that time she kept sitting up, trying to stand up and got a little snappy with her mouth. I had some duct tape there and I taped her mouth shut while I tried to keep up with her. ( not tight, just snug enough so she couldnt bite)
I was by myself and it sure gave me piece of mind while I was at the other end!

Finally when she settled, I took the tape off. She turned out to be an excellent mother.

My very first pregnant gilt ended up killing half of her litter several years ago. If it weren't for this site and all of the great people I have come in contact with, I most likely would be doing something else..........!

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Post by showerr » Wed Jan 20, 2010 10:03 pm

We are always wary of our gilts. We try not to let the piglets scream and we keep them in a basket with a heat lamp until labor is over. If the mom is doing good, we put the already-born pigs in there to nurse in between contractions. We're just careful to keep them away from her head and quiet.

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