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Nathan Smith from Kansas Smith Farms, Are your Sows overweight? August 14th 2012

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Are your sows fat?

Probably

Recently, Blaine Hansen, a nutritionist at Ralco Animal Nutrition, recently visited with me about lactation intake, sow condition and sow performance.  He showed me tons of data that demonstrated the connection between increased sow lactation intake and better sow performance. Yes, I have heard this many, many times. I’m sure you have, too. But I forget.
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I goes something like this.
“How much do you feed your sows in gestation?”
“4 lbs.”
“Well, maybe 5 lbs.”
“I’m not sure.”
This is when I usually feel like an idiot.
I have not been keeping track of sow intake. Have you been tracking gestation and lactation intake?
“My sows are a condition 3” Mine are too.
AKA too fat!
It is so freaking important!!
If you are over feeding:

Over    Cost per 1000 sows/ 300 days
0.25    $12,000
0.50    $24,000
0.75    $36,000
1.00    $48,000
That is just wasted feed.

What are you doing to track sow feed intake?

About Nathan:

Hi, my name is Nathan Smith and I am the Modern Hog Farmer.  During the day, I am the Leadership Director of Kansas Smith Farms. We have about 100 great and dedicated people and a lot of pigs. We care for about 10,000 sows and raise about 250,000 hogs per year. My purpose here is to be honest and open about hog farming. I want to share the lessons I have been learning while raising pigs for 7 years. I used to think that working in animal agriculture was a boring, discouraging, ungrateful, and stinky industry to work in. But I have changed my mind and here is my story.

Contact info
Nathan Smith
23179 5 Rd
Plains, KS 67869

 

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1 Comment

  1. Rhoda
    Posted on August 14, 2012 at 11:37 am

    Mr. Smith, Dave Warner, director of communications for NPPC, made the following comment: “So our animals can’t turn around for the 2.5 years they are in [gestation] stalls. I don’t know who asked the sow if she want to turn around”. So you agree with this statement, or are your pigs and other animals treated humanely?

    Reply

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