The goal for a breeding area design should be maximum performance with minimum labor. I like a design where the animals flow through the facility without a lot of extra effort on workers’ part. For example, in some breeding barns I visit, employees are constantly switching panels back and forth just to move animals to and from the breeding area. There’s too much time spent moving animals, not breeding them.

			Dr. Darwing Reicks

In Woodville Pork II’s new gestation-breeding barn, there are two distinct breeding areas or hubs. Within each breeding hub, there are several breeding pens with boar crates interspersed between the pens. The two breeding hubs are located close together near the center of the barn. This allows for good interaction between managers and employees to improve heat detection and breeding techniques. Open gilts and weaned sows are kept within a short distance of the breeding areas, with rows of gestation crates making up the rest of the barn. The drawing shows a close-up of one of the breeding areas.

Some farms can make breeding in the stalls work, but I prefer this type of design where sows can be bred in a pen, adjacent to the boar. An often underappreciated component of the breeding process is the boar. Multiple studies dating back to the early 1970s have shown that a higher percentage of gilts show standing heat when they are brought in small groups to the boar versus taking the boar to gilts in crates. Nose-to-nose boar contact during the mating process is key. Barns should also contain enough crates so that sows and gilts can remain near the boar for further stimulation just after breeding.

Animals to be bred move in a circular pattern. Sows exit their crates from the front, walk down a short alleyway to the breeding pen. They return by exiting the breeding pen on the opposite side, moving down another short alleyway and walking forward into the crate. In some facilities, sows and gilts are backed out of crates which can be a hassle for the people moving them. Quick-latch gates for breeding pens are also an important, user-friendly feature in Woodville’s new facility.

			The drawing shows one breeding area in one section of a 585 x 81' breeding-gestation barn at Woodville Pork II.

There’s another aspect of the Woodville Pork II facility design that I really like – crates for boars. Farms don’t have as much experience training and working with boars as in the past, so it is best to control the boar’s movement. In loose pens, the boar can walk to the opposite side of the pen from the sow, making it more difficult to detect heat. When boars are in crates, the breeder only has to worry about keeping the sow in the proper position to have good nose to nose contact during the breeding process.

A sow farm’s overall productivity largely depends on consistent breeding success. Here is a summary of important goals producers should consider when designing a modern breeding facility:

• Circular flow of weaned sows to the breeding pens and back home.
• Ability to breed sows in a pen next to the boar.
• Boar confined in a crate so he can't walk away from a sow in heat.
• Quick-latch gates.
• Enough pens to allow post breeding stimulation.
• Breeding pens that are close to each other which promotes teamwork and makes getting a second opinion about heat status convenient.

If you would like to contact Dr. Reicks, write to him at dreicks@swinevetcenter.com.

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