Don’t believe the myth that weaned sows don’t eat.
They’ll eat fine, but they need to be treated gingerly, like they’ve just gone through a lot, an Alberta hog feeding expert told the Manitoba Swine Seminar.
“We really have to give her the best of everything,” Malachy Young, president of Gowans Feed Consulting in Wainwright, Alta., said in an interview after a presentation to the conference.
He said the “weaned sows don’t eat” myth is based on weaned sows not eating much between weaning and rebreeding.
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That happens, he said, but only because they’re being fed wrong.
A sow that has just weaned up to a dozen piglets is in a delicate situation. Its mammary system has been maxxed out and its hormone levels are shifting around.
Food and water that are made available together in a feeder is not terribly appetizing, especially if some of the food sits in the water for an hour and begins to sour.
However, it will likely eat more and eat more consistently if food is made available dry with a separate water source.
“We’re really seeing with the newer systems where guys are putting the feed and water separately, that these sows are eating a lot more than we really think (traditionally that they would,)” said Young.
Sows that eat more steadily after weaning and before rebreeding tend to have bigger litters in subsequent pregnancies and rebreed faster.
