A 2 pig litter

cab97 · Post by **cab97** » Sat Jan 28, 2012 8:11 pm

My gilt had her pigs today but there was only 2 pigs what do you think caused this?

buckibri · Post by **buckibri** » Sun Jan 29, 2012 8:13 am

cab97 wrote:My gilt had her pigs today but there was only 2 pigs what do you think caused this?

AI or natural bred?

It happens. Can be her genetics, her environment, semen quality, timing ..... had very good litter size this winter except for a 3rd parity sow that had 3 with previous litters of 11.

cab97 · Post by **cab97** » Sun Jan 29, 2012 1:18 pm

She was AI'ed

Pigmandog · Post by **Pigmandog** » Sun Jan 29, 2012 9:50 pm

well did you provide her with enough stimulation? u have to be the boar to get her stimulated properly to get fertilized eggs.

#winning

DrAmy · Post by **DrAmy** » Mon Jan 30, 2012 9:41 am

There could be a thousand reasons why she only had 2 pigs. She would have had more eggs fertilized to start with, but the rest obviously didn't make it. A sow will not maintain a pregnancy unless there are at least 4 embryos present at the time of maternal recognition of pregnancy - around days 12 and 28. Early embryonic mortality after these times may result in these small litters of twins and triplets. Any number of things may cause this early embyonic mortality - any type of stress, etc. She likely didn't have may fertilized embyos to start with either - also due to a thousand possibilities from semen quality, timing, technique, etc.

Botton line is - sometimes, this just happens!

Ericka · Post by **Ericka** » Mon Jan 30, 2012 9:59 am

It can happen I had a litter of three 4 years ago. All born alive and normal size. Weaned all three. The nice thing about it was it was hardly any work. haha

A 2 pig litter

A 2 pig litter

Re: A 2 pig litter