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ACES C-FAR RESEARCH PORTFOLIO
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| Project Number | 99I-097-3 | Renewal # | Status | Completed | |||||||||
| Project Title | More Efficient Pen Design for Growing Pigs | ||||||||||||
| Investigator | Michael Ellis | ||||||||||||
| Department | Animal Sciences | ||||||||||||
| Total Funding | $50,000.00 | ||||||||||||
| Type of Research |
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| Funding Period | July 1, 1998 | -- | December 31, 2000 | ||||||||||
| Research Area | Agricultural Production Systems | ||||||||||||
| Outcomes |
Recently, there have been some major innovations and changes in the design of facilities for nursery and growing finishing pigs which are being applied on many units within the State of Illinois and elsewhere. Two major developments have been the adoption of large group sizes (100 pigs per pen or more) and the development of wean-to-finish housing systems. Both of these innovations have significant potential advantages. However, there is limited, if any, objective data from research studies from which to estimate their economic impact on production systems. A series of studies has been completed with nursery pigs investigating the impact of large groups on animal performance and on the economics of the nursery system. This research has been carried out on the research farm of a commercial feed company (United Feeds, Sheridan, IN) which has a substantial involvement in the Illinois swine industry. These studies have shown a substantial reduction in both physical and economic performance for nursery units using large groups (100 pigs/pen) compared to conventional size groups (20 pigs per pen). Additional studies carried out under this project have attempted to overcome the negative effect of large groups on nursery pig performance by changing feeder placement within the pen to improve feeder access. However, similar reductions in performance to previous studies for the large groups have been observed suggesting some factor other than access to feed is causing the poorer growth. This research is being extended to growing finishing pigs. This research has produced some of the first objective information for producers to use to make decisions on group size related to facility design. Testimony to the impact of this research was the award of the National Pork Producers Council Applied Swine Research Award for a paper presenting the results of this research at the 2000 meeting of the Midwestern Section of the American Society of Animal Science.
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| Dissemination | Presentations at scientific, producer and industry meetings, papers/articles in scientific literature, two popular press articles, one Masters Thesis, two publications in scientific journals, three abstracts of presentations at conferences, and presented at a total of six producer meetings/seminars | ||||||||||||
| Beneficiaries | Pork producers | ||||||||||||
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University
of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences 1101 West Peabody Drive 279 National Soybean Research Center, MC-637 Urbana, IL 61801 Phone: 217-265-0792 Fax: 217-265-4070 Email: g-fahey@uiuc.edu or wiegel@uiuc.edu |
