Old breeds, new solutions? Effects of two different traditional sire breeds on skin lesions, tail lesions, tail losses, performance and behaviour of rearing pigs.

Abstract

Some studies indicated a relationship between modern, fast-growing, lean-meat-producing hybrid pigs and the occurrence of tail-biting, one of the major issues of conventional pig husbandry. Therefore, this study investigated the effects of different local, traditional sire breeds on the behaviour and performance of rearing pigs. Between December 2019 and November 2020, a total of 1561 piglets were weaned from hybrid sows (Bundes Hybrid Zucht Programm (BHZP) Landrace×BHZP Large White) that were paired with either Swabian-Hall (SH), Bentheim Black Pied (BB) or BHZP-Piétrain (Pi) boars. Tails of the piglets were left intact (43.5%) or docked (56.5%), and male piglets were castrated. Piglets were conventionally reared on fully slatted plastic flooring in mixed-sex groups. Starting one day after weaning, skin lesions were scored once per pig, and tail lesions and losses were scored weekly until the end of rearing. The average daily gain was documented for the suckling and rearing period. The activity behaviour of eight focal pens was analysed using video recordings. Differences between modern and traditional breeds were found in this study for so-called aggressive and non-aggressive biting pronounced by skin and tail lesions and tail losses. Significantly fewer BB pigs had severe skin lesions on the front body than SH or Pi pigs (P<0.05). Additionally, piglets that were classified as light (<5.6kg) at weaning showed skin lesion scores of 0 more often than piglets that were classified with a medium (≥5.6-≤8.3kg) or heavy (>8.3kg) weaning weight (P<0.05). In the first half of the rearing period, significantly more BB pigs were assessed as having no tail lesions and tail losses than SH and Pi pigs (P<0.01). However, these differences disappeared in the second half of rearing. Either docked or undocked Pi pigs had significantly higher average daily gains than SH and BB pigs (P<0.05). The activity of the focal pens was not influenced by the sire breed or tail lesion class, which might be due to the limited sample size of eight pens. To conclude, the use of the traditional sire breed BB has the potential to reduce injurious behaviour in the offspring. However, adjustments to the housing and feeding should be taken to further reduce the incidence of tail lesions and losses and to enhance performance.