A sense of pride from free access stall use
A sense of pride comes over Danish farm manager Henrik Mikkelsen when seeing that his sows are in good shape. He keeps his sows in a free access group housing system during gestation. One stall, one sow – and it works fine.
It is only one year ago, that production went up to 100% at the new farrow-to-finish production facility at Risgaarden near Viborg, Denmark. These days, the conception rate in the dry sow unit is 95%, achieving 33 piglets weaned/sow/year. A housing system that places the different units in a logical way and a pen design which optimises the individual sow’s performance are just some of the reasons for the fast results. Add to that the farm staff’s energy – and there’s a recipe for success.
For Henrik Mikkelsen, farm manager, the complex is his life. He explains, “I’m a free man here. My job is to be where I’m needed.” He is responsible for five employees as well as all feed production. Two employees are Ukrainian; the others are Danish. Soon two Romanians will join the team. To be sure that everybody is doing what is necessary, Mikkelsen talks a lot with them. “I see to it that we have two breaks every day together – this is when we talk about things. This also means that I can catch up with situations before they become habits which may be no good,” he says.
The service unit consists of 450 stalls of 70 cm wide, manufactured by the Danish company Egebjerg International, just like most other housing equipment on the farm. In an adjacent unit, there is an area with an additional 246 stalls – 106 of which are for gilts (60 cm wide) and an additional 138 stalls (70 cm) wide for more sows. The boars are kept in pens in a separate boar unit.
Sows and gilts are serviced in one unit. After about 3 or 3.5 weeks they are moved into a group housing area. There are two of these units at Risgaarden, each with 20 pens consisting of 26 free access stalls. Mikkelsen discovered how they can avoid aggression when mixing a new group of sows in the housing system. He says, “After we have moved the sows, we lock them up in the stalls for a couple of days. Then they can get used to the new surroundings and some of the other sows, without getting into fights from day one. This works.”
As from 7.15am, one of the employees checks all sows in the gestation units, wiping concrete slats in case they are too slippery and giving the sows more straw. At about 9am, all 40 pens have been taken care of and each sow has been checked.
Risgaarden farm, Denmark
Total farm size: 2,050 sows
Output: 67,000 piglets/year
Finisher section: 10,000 pigs/year
Sold: 57,000 piglets/year at 7 kg
Liveborn per litter: 16.5
Stillborn per litter: 1.6
Piglets produced/sow/year: 33
Conception rate: 95%
Join 18,000+ subscribers
Subscribe to our newsletter to stay updated about all the need-to-know content in the pigsector, three times a week.
