Breeding for resilience in finishing pigs can decrease tail biting, lameness and mortality.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Previous research showed that deviations in longitudinal data are heritable and can be used as a proxy for pigs' general resilience. However, only a few studies investigated the relationship between these resilience traits and other traits related to resilience and welfare. Therefore, this study investigated the relationship between resilience traits derived from deviations in longitudinal data and traits related to animal resilience, health and welfare, such as tail and ear biting wounds, lameness and mortality.

Results

In our experiment, 1919 finishing pigs with known pedigree (133 Piétrain sires and 266 crossbred dams) were weighed every 2 weeks and scored for physical abnormalities, such as lameness and ear and tail biting wounds (17,066 records). Resilience w

SUBMITTER: Gorssen W 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11191330 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature