New technology offers insight

French breeders trialling an on-farm trolley unit designed to make treatment and care much easier

Pig industry technology leaders in France are trialling an on-farm trolley unit which they have designed to make the handling of piglets easier during treatment, and also for those caring for them.

Developed by Asserva Engineering, Brittany, in collaboration with France’s pork research institute, Ifip, the unit – which is called Smart’Care, –can be adjusted by the stockman to his own optimum operating height.

This avoids the need for workers to either bend down to catch a target piglet or to have to lift it up to the unit for whatever task needs to be completed.

To operate, staff place the trolley next to a sow cage, lower the holding box of the unit to ground level and usher the piglets inside.

The box can then be raised to the best operating height for the worker concerned.

Once the handling process has been completed, a hatch, similar to a pet flap, is opened to allow the piglets to return to the sows via a fitted slide.

The unit, which is motorised, also includes a weighing facility, linked to an identification system.

The box in which the piglets are placed for handling is fitted with an RFID antenna.

Provided the piglets already have an electronic tag, this enables individual weights to be taken and recorded.

The same French company, which currently has its first on-farm development nearing completion in Scotland, has also developed a precision water and feed consumption tool for piglets and finishing pigs.

Called Pig-insight, the new tool is equipped to recognise each pig by its chip, allowing it to feed individual animals according to their own feeding curve.

The company says the precision feeding system avoids competition between pigs at the trough.

It does this by ensuring each animal is given the feed that meets the individual requirements in terms of quantity and quality.

Asserva also maintain that by being able to watch and adjust the consumption of feed and water to individual piglets, Pig-insight can also be used to alert staff when an animal is not feeding or drinking normally.

As such, they believe the system doubles as the industry’s ‘first individual predictive method’ of the presence of pathologies.

The unit can be adjusted by the stockman to his own optimum operating height.