1. Environmental Sanitation

Environmental sanitation is crucial to the farrowing crate. We should sweep, wash and sterilize the pigsty, farrowing pen and delivery room before transferring the pregnant sows. Many people use surplus carpet, plywood or rubber sheet to keep out the wind, providing a comfortable environment for piglets. All the staff should be cleaned, disinfected and dried before using for the pig pen. We should do disinfection early on for buying more time of drying the pig crate and vacancy of the farrowing crates. The vacancy of the farrowing crate can prevent the circulation of the pathogenic bacteria. Most pathogenic bacteria of diseases could be got rid of in the process of washing. Other pathogenic bacteria are destroyed fertilization and drying, or be eliminated by the three means together.

2. Gestation crate, floor and heating lamp

We can adopt the following steps to provide an optimum pig crate for the swines and piglets.

①Check out the gestation crate, flooring and equipment.To protect the knees and nipples of the pigs, we should take measures to smooth the floor. And we should repair thoroughly and maintain the gestation crate regularly. We should use sealant to block up any cracks considering pathogen may hide in the crevices of the cement concrete floor. We can ask the local agricultural material retailer or agronomist for advice about how to choose the suitable sealant.

②Examine the water spray nozzle and assure it works well. We should clean or replace the filter if the water flow decreases.

③Make sure the heating lamp of the pig pen is in good condition, and keep the power line away from the swines and piglets. When we adopt 250 watts light bulb, the heating lamp should be installed 45cm higher above the ground to ensure the environment temperature of 34℃. If you hang the heating lamp too high, the light bulb works only as a light source. If you hang it lower than 45cm, the piglets will feel uncomfortable about the hot heating lamp. So we can measure the distance with a flexible rule to guarantee the height of the heating lamp of the farrowing crate.

3. Pig sanitation

Before removing them to the gestation crate, we should wash sows with mild soap which helps clean the dirt and pathogen of them. Meanwhile, we can examine the nipples of the swine to foresee how many piglets she can raise. Sanitation protects the sows from mange, lice, and influence the lactation of swines. We should transfer the swines into gestation crate one week ahead of their date of delivery, which can help them to get familiar with the new environment.

We should pay much attention to the pregnant swines, especially the primiparous sows. It is important for comforting the sows by scratch, massage or chat with the pigs, which are helpful to the sensitive pregnant sows. Additionally, we can play the radio in the pig pen to let the sows get familiar with the sounds and activities of people. In the meantime, we should examine the health situation of the pigs meticulously.

Turn on the heating lamp of the pig crate one day ahead of the delivery date of swines, make sure the heating lamp works well in the right place. During the final physical examination of the pigs, we should assure the dung of the pigs has been cleaned. Or it will ruin all of your efforts.

About the farrowing crate

It’ s a big turn for the piglets that barely weaning from the breast when they are moved into the nursery crate and live independently. Piglets are vulnerable and inadequate in this period, while it’s also the fastest growth period of the piglets.

Therefore, we should guarantee the nursery crate is clean, dry, warm in a ventilating environment.

Nowadays, more modernized pig farms choose the pig farrowing crate. The pig farrowing crate also called pig gestation stall and consists of metal or polyethylene flooring, stall, automatic feeder and so on. The urine and dung seep out of the crate through the special flooring with mesh which keeps the gestation stall dry and clean, prevents the piglets from contaminated by the dung, and decrease diseases. The farrowing crate is an optimum gestation equipment to increase the survival rate of piglets.

Standards of nursery crate of piglets

① 0.3 ㎡ space for one piglet

② 16 – 24 pigs in one pig pen

③ Class eight pigs into one group and separate the groups with clapboard

④ Four pigs share one feeder in a 15 decimeter space

⑤ It’s better to adopt polypropylene swine nursery flooring for the piglets

⑥ Place the piglets which is barely weaning from breast in a heat preservation zone

⑦ You have done a good job if the 8-week piglets weigh more than 20kg

⑧ Vaccinate the piglets to enhance their disease-resistant ability