Farrowing room temps

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torf
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Farrowing room temps

Post by torf » Mon Feb 04, 2013 8:00 pm

I keep my farrowing area at 67 on my thermostat. I have heat pads and a heat lamp on one side of the crate. Well last night I hade a gilt farrow that was due on Wednesday. She had 16 but 10 had died. They were all spread out on the side of the crate without the lamp and pad. It did not appear that any were caught in the placenta and no trauma it appears they just got cold and went down. I am just sick but have never had this happen before. All other times the pigs farrow and migrate to the heat lamp. The 6 alive are perfectly health and the others all looked fine. Should a heat lamp be on both sides of the crate? I do live in Wisconsin and yes it was cold, last night low was around 0. Should I keep the barn warmer? Never want to go through this again.

buckibri
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Re: Farrowing room temps

Post by buckibri » Mon Feb 04, 2013 10:24 pm

Yea, winter farrowing and chilling of the pigs. Gilt farrowing 16 would tend to think they would be smaller than average pig size and that is possible an issue. Small pigs tend to be weaker and also chill quicker. Farrowing two days early (assuming your breeding date is right) is also a big conributing issue.

Also, pure genetics tend to have less vigor that good F1 or F2 crosses. SHowpig lines are so mongrilized I hav eno clue what hybrid vigor we would see with shop pig cross lines.

Sounds like your barn temp is fine with heat lamps/mats. My bet would be had she farrowed 10-11 on day 114 or so the litter would hav ebeen fine.

DrAmy
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Re: Farrowing room temps

Post by DrAmy » Tue Feb 05, 2013 2:53 pm

Most farrowing rooms are kept at 70-75 degrees. But I am a stong proponent of heat lamps on both sides of the crate so that the pigs find it regardless of which way they go after birth. Keep them near the rear 1/3 of the crate so that pigs are not lured up towards the sow's head when farrowing. Chilling/drafting is the absolute worst thing that can happen to newborn pigs.

Mary-Okie
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Re: Farrowing room temps

Post by Mary-Okie » Tue Feb 05, 2013 9:30 pm

it was a big litter and they came early, so most likely they were pretty small and might not have had a lot of energy at birth. With your farrowing room at 67, you need heat on both sides of the sow especially with it that cold outside. you are loosing heat to the outside so it's going feel colder.

Sounds like you needed to be there when she farrowed. Probably would have saved quite a few of them. I start checking for milk 2 - 3 days before they are due. When I find one with milk, I keep a close eye on her until she farrows. Average price for a showpig is $200. that was potentially $2,000 lost!
Colby Ferguson
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“Show class, have pride, and display character. If you do, winning takes care of itself.” Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant

torf
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Re: Farrowing room temps

Post by torf » Wed Feb 06, 2013 7:29 pm

I agree Mary-Okie I would love to be at there side but work comes first before the pigs and I work 24 hour shifts. Just looking for Ideas so it does not happen again. I can push temps to 80 inside if I need to as I heat with wood from an out door boiler. Just never had them not migrate to the heat side before. I will set up both sides with heat lamps and bump up temps to try to fix this problem.

buckibri
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Re: Farrowing room temps

Post by buckibri » Wed Feb 06, 2013 7:50 pm

torf wrote:I agree Mary-Okie I would love to be at there side but work comes first before the pigs and I work 24 hour shifts. Just looking for Ideas so it does not happen again. I can push temps to 80 inside if I need to as I heat with wood from an out door boiler. Just never had them not migrate to the heat side before. I will set up both sides with heat lamps and bump up temps to try to fix this problem.

For those of us that can't live with every sow that farrows we will have crap that happens sometimes.

Your room temp is not an issue. You want the room cool for the sows comfort and you want the pigs to move to the heat lamp for zone warmth vs staying under the sow when she gets up to eat/drink and crap. If you are too warm the pigs have a greater chance of being crushed.

The gilt simply had a big litter a bit early. The pigs were not strong enough and just needed full gestation length and a few less siblings.

m.mayer
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Re: Farrowing room temps

Post by m.mayer » Tue Sep 26, 2017 8:51 am

I think everyone can agree that every piglet is precious and to lose even one is a heartbreaking disappointment. Especially when the piglet was initially born healthy. When the litter is large, piglets compete aggressively for the limited amount of heated space given by typical heat lamps. The larger piglets will then push their smaller siblings out of the heated areas and "hog" the best heat for themselves. When this happens, those piglets left out in the cold begin burning their brown fat to keep warm. They grow weaker and are unable to feed, or succumb to hypothermia. In either case, the result is the same.

Proper heat in the farrowing crate can be tricky. Piglets need between 90F-103F to thrive. But only inches away, the sow needs an ambient barn temperature of around 65F. You can see the challenge here. Round quartz heaters heat the air, which warms the piglets but spill heat onto the sow. She becomes restless, goes off her food, spends less time nursing, and has a greater risk of stepping on babies. Heating pads are better, but they only heat one side of the piglet (think of laying on a heated mattress pad with no blankets and your bedroom is 65F.) They are also difficult to fully sanitize and can also harbor PED bacteria.

Here's the best solution, for a great many reasons which I will enumerate here. Get rid of your glass heaters. They're just not well suited for farrowing, or any barn environment for that matter. Yes, they're cheap to purchase, but far more expensive if you're losing piglets or they burn out in the middle of the night. Or they break and start your barn on fire. For show pigs, I highly recommend going to electric Ceramic Infrared Radiant Heaters. You place one on either side of the sow, so that no matter where the piglets roam, they're going to have adequate heat. You can use regular black mats or heated pads with them as well, but heated pads are not really necessary. The reason for this is that the medium to long range infrared rays are readily absorbed by both the piglets and the black mats. The mats then radiate the heat back onto the piglets from underneath.

Why Ceramic Infrared Radiant heaters? First, they are non light emitting, which means 100% of the energy given off as heat. Quartz glass heaters waste 10% of your electric bill as light. Piglets don't need a spotlight, they need heat. These heaters are rectangular, and they heat a rectangular space of your creep. This is because they do not warm the air, they directly warm the piglet and quickly raise core body temperature. This means there is no heated air spilling onto the sow making her uncomfortable. These heater systems are very affordable and they last about 3 years. Another huge benefit, they won't explode if moisture hits them when they are on. So no worries about barn fires starting that way like glass heaters.

Check out these links. The first one is a website where you can find these. The second is an install video that shows what the single system looks like.

http://www.nexthermal.com/product/elste ... ystem.aspx

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxPtdc- ... e=youtu.be

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