First Turn's A Charm

It’s not often that a new finisher barn produces 2.11-pound ADG and over $4.00/pig in packer premiums. Particularly when you consider that barn was using an untested feeding program in combination with a sort scale system.  But that’s what Thome Farms pulled off in the first turn through their 2500-head double-wide near Adams, MN.

The barn is equipped with sort scales and a Feedlogic FeedSaver S-Series feed system, allowing pigs to be fed a more precise ration based on their sex and weight. Two rations were kept in the four bins serving the two-room facility, a high-protein diet and a low-protein diet.  Gilts were placed in one room, barrows in the other and specific feed curves were developed for each group. As the pigs grew, the FeedSaver system automatically blended the diets to provide the right ration for each stage of growth. 

The “race-track” style design allowed barn owner Matt Thome to keep each room divided into two groups, one taking up around two thirds of the space, the other the remaining one third. Lighter pigs were sorted to the smaller area, consisting of 6 feeders, while the main population was kept in the larger area serviced by 15 feeders.

When it came close to marketing, the scales were reversed to push the heavier pigs into the smaller area and make it easier to load pigs out. Diets were also adjusted to each group to ensure the lighter pigs remained on a higher lysine ration.

The group averaged over 85% in the red box at Hormel's Austin packing plant. Matt Thome believes they could have been even better if he had been able to schedule more loads over a shorter period. “We couldn’t ship them fast enough and we ended up heavier than we wanted to be on some of the pigs,” he says.

Thome says targeting the diets at each group helped reduce variation and contributed to the impressive average growth rate. He experimented with various scale settings to ensure correct stocking densities in each area before settling on a 3-pound differential. Each day, the scale was adjusted to sort off pigs that are three pounds lighter than the main population. This typically represents around 25% of the pigs, meaning the lighter pigs are stocked at a lower density and have less competition at the feeder.

Thome reduced feed costs by feeding the barrows and gilts separately. The barrows averaged 13% higher feed intake and were pushed onto lower lysine, lower cost diets sooner than the gilts. 

Table 1 – Thome Turn 1 Pig Numbers

Table 2 – Thome Turn 1 Facility Utilization

Table 3 – Thome Turn 1 Gain

Table 4 – Thome Turn 1 Feed

Table 5 – Thome Turn 1 Carcass Data*

* All shipped to Hormel plant, Austin, MN

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