Porcine Health Management

Optimal reproductive performance is crucial for economic success in commercial pig herds. Different management strategies, such as optimized feeding strategies, hyperprolific dam lines, batch farrowing systems and extended photoperiod during the post-weaning phase, are applied in order to meet the high performance expectations of modern sow farmers. However, inevitable variations in farm conditions, such as season, infection pressure or feed ingredients can negatively impact the results of high productive genetics.

Progesterone level can be used to determine precise moment of the reproductive cycle in gilts/ sows. Reproductive cycle has a folicular and luteal phase (high levels of progesterone). During luteal phase, progesterone level increases until day 12-14 when the luteal corpus (LC) become sensitive to PGF2α and progesterone level decreases in 48h just until the next estrus. Prepuberty gilts just around heat, have very low progesterone levels; 24-48h post-heat progesterone levels are high and remain high for at least 15-18 days indicating LC presence; finally 24-48h prior to heat progesterone levels drop very quickly again. The objective of this study is to demonstrate under field conditions how a commercial kit Ovu-check® can help establish whether a group of gilts that have not manifested consistent heat symptoms had cycled or not.

The lower prolificacy of the Iberian sows breed (IS) can be due to a lower ovulation rate, a lower percentage of fertilization, a lower implantation rate. The limited uterine space for embryo implantation would justify the greater embryonic losses.

The use of artificial insemination (AI) with fresh semen is one of the key tools that have established the basis of exponential growth in world pork production last years. The success of the AI is basically due to that it is an economical and easy technique to use in pig farms of any size. Furthermore, the reproductive performance achieved with AI is optimal.

The genetic selection for increased litter size has resulted in a disproportionate increase in ovulation rate (OR). A higher OR was linearly related with decreased placental length at day 35 of pregnancy, which could inhibit foetal growth during further pregnancy (Da Silva et al., 2016). As increased litter size has resulted in a decreased piglet birth weight and increased within litter birth weight variation, we investigated the relationship between OR and litter characteristics at term.

A repeat-breeding (RB) occurrence increases non-productive days of female pigs
(NPD), and consequently decreases herd productivity. However, characteristics of RB female pigs are not well defined or studied in swine. Also, few studies have compared lifetime reproductive performance between RB and non-RB female pigs.