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Newborn mammals are born with a well-developed sucking behavior, their first milk they obtain is called colostrum, it contains nutrients for thermoregulation and early locomotion as well as antibodies needed to counter diaereses. These animals seek safety and warmth from their mother for the first few weeks as well. (Pg. 157)

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Internal Look at a Sow Reproductive Tract

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Internal Look at a Sow Reproductive Tract

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UK College of Agriculture, Food, and Environment

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Non pregnant sow reproductive tract dissection

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Bill Silvia dissects a non pregnant sow's reproductive tract

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Swine instincts play a key role in the breeding and production of swine. No one had to teach the wild boar to mount the sow in heat or the sow to instinctive lock up when she is ready to be bred. The same thing can be said for little pigs right after being born, just minutes after birth the baby pig will stumble up to its mothers teet and begin nursing to get colostrum milk (reference Neonatal Feeding Behavior for more information), same can be said when the mother beginning to vocalize that she is about to lay down, they use these instincts and senses that are born with to survive in captivity and the wild.

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No matter what age or sex when pigs are mixed with a foreign animal they will fight to establish dominance, no matter if its just a simple fight to see who gets the bigger pile of feed or its two males fighting to breed the females in a large commercial setting there must be a dominance established within the first few days to avoid lifetime fighting which leads to injuries and sustained weight loss.

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Senses that Pigs Utilize to Breed and Farrow

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Senses that Pigs Utilize to Breed and Farrow

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From the moment pigs are born their olfactory senses are extremely developed. They pigs use this to distinguish their mothers at birth and through their life cycles rely on this keen sense to lead them to food and to find a mate. Pigs have a panoramic vision range of about 310 degrees. Pigs are also able to somewhat see in color, since they have such good vision traits any significant change in visual stimuli can affect their mating habits.

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Below is the process used when artificially inseminating a sow.

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Post-Cervical Artificial Insemination in Sows AS-623-WV

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This video is about Post-Cervical Artificial Insemination in Sows. You can find this video and more at https://mdc.itap.purdue.edu/item.asp?Item_Number=AS-623-WV#.VL_uCU3wvRY.

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Artificial Selection of Traits for the Showpig Industry

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Artificial Selection of Traits for the Showpig Industry

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There is a big difference between breeding commercial hogs for growth and muscle mass and selecting traits to create the next great show animal. Commercial livestock are bred and raised to strictly produce a quality meat product, therefor great emphasis is placed on selecting sires with desirable carcass traits along with growth characteristics. The showpig industry requires a completely different set of traits, boars are selected based on their pedigree, look and feature and unlike the commercial side muscle and performance traits seem to fall to the wayside.

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1. Comes into estrus every 21 days
2. In heat for 2-3 days where they release pheramones and enter standing heat
3. Mouted by boar or insiminated artifically
4. Gestate for 3 months 3 weeks and 3 days (114 days)
5. Lactation lasts about 3-5 weeks (usually first litter should be born on the females first birthday)
6. 3-7 days after being weaned sows will come back into heat to possibly be bred again

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Of females:
-Abnormal vocalization
-Swelled vulva
-Fluid discharge from vulva
-Erect ears and locking up when seeing/ smelling a boar
Of Males:
-Abnormal aggression
-Abnormal vocalization
-Grinding teeth
-Discharge of a foamy saliva
-As pictured below, rubbing the sows flank area and sniffing of the vulva to stimulate the female

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By no means a new technique but a very difficult one to be good at, with this research study it shows us that  artificial insemination requires a higher level of management than natural service mating systems and also has to take human error into effect. However the positives greatly outweigh the negative when it comes to this method, no courtship rituals need to be preformed, there is no worries during the breeding process of the female being hurt by the male and depending on semen costs it can be more inexpensive because there doesn't have to be a boar present on the farm at all times.

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The influence of conditions at the time of mating on reproduction of commercial pigs

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The influence of conditions at the time of mating on reproduction of commercial pigs

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In this case study we see that using a detection mating area, which is a large pen of females surrounded by boars on either side, increased the females reproductive performance by increasing litter size and young born alive. The whole purpose was to improve the physical and sexual environments of the pigs at mating, and as you can read below that outcome was successful.