Joe Kluender and his daughter, Shea.

Joe Kluender, a Waldorf, MN, swine producer, says that using whey in his nursery rations makes good economic sense. A pelleted ration that typically costs about $900 per ton can be replaced with a $400 wheybased, grind-and-mix ration. But — and there's a big one — Kluender says whey-based diets are a nightmare if your feeders aren't able to handle the sticky consistency of the dairy by-product.

If the agitator is a bit stiff and difficult for pigs to work as they eat, whey-based and other non-flowing feeds tend to get lodged beneath the agitator gate. This means the feeder gets plugged, feed flow gets cut off and intake drops. Kluender says there can also be a great deal of aggravation if the feeder adjustment mechanism is one that's difficult to operate or hard to access.

"We needed a feeder that's simple to adjust as we go from the whey-based product that's quite sticky, to a grind-and-mix feed that flows easily," explains Kluender, who is a shareholder in a fivemember sow cooperative and partner in a newly-established farrow-to-finish operation.

Kluender installed Farmweld Nursery Feeders when he converted his farrow-to-finish set-up into nursery facilities in 1994. He says he's been very impressed with how well the feeders work with all six rations used in the nurseries, including the whey-based diet. "The Farmweld feeder has the capacity to handle all types of feed," says Kluender.

The Farmweld Nursery Feeder adjustment cranks are extremely easy to operate by simply rotating them to open or close the agitator, according to Kluender. His goal is to set the feeders so there's about a half of an inch of feed at the back of the pan, with the rest of the feed pan empty. He says it is easy for his daughter, Shea, 16, who pitches in to do chores when Kluender is away from the farm, or him to achieve that goal with the Farmweld feeders. Kluender also says the simple, yet effective crank locks ensure the pigs can't wiggle the feeders out of adjustment.

Kluender and his partners in the new operation also installed Farmweld Nursery Feeders, which Kluender says are working well. In addition to ease of adjustment, Kluender says he's impressed with how comfortable the small pigs seem when they use the feeders.