Hogs Housing - Facilities

New Oral Fluid Guidelines Offer Cost-Effective Disease Monitoring for Group-Housed Sows

Mon, 08 Dec 2025 19:36:42 GMT

Collect oral fluid samples from group-housed sows by hanging two cotton ropes per pen and allowing 60 to 90 minutes of sampling time to yield best results, suggests a recent study funded by the Swine Health Information Center (SHIC) and led by Jeff Zimmerman at Iowa State University.

As more breeding herds shift to housing sows in groups, the need for validating practical and cost-effective disease surveillance protocols in this population is greater than ever.

Oral fluid sampling has become a popular way to monitor herd health because it’s non-invasive, cost-effective and efficient. It’s also simple and safe for caretakers to collect, according to a recent nationwide survey on oral fluid sampling in U.S. swine farms published in Pathogens .

Zimmerman’s oral fluids sampling study in group-housed sows set out to determine practicality and best practices for the swine industry.

What Did the Sows’ Behavior Reveal?

Researchers conducted the study on a 6,500-head commercial breed-to-wean sow farm. Oral fluids were collected using two ropes per pen for four consecutive days across the pens. Sow behavior towards the ropes was characterized by individually marking a sub-set of animals and a 90-minute video observation was recorded, the study shows.

Results revealed oral fluids can be routinely collected from group-housed gestating sows using cotton ropes, a process used successfully in growing pig populations. In all groups and on all sampling days, the volume of oral fluid collected during the study was more than adequate to conduct diagnostic tests.

Larger Animals Need Longer Sampling Time

However, experts caution that sampling time in group-housed sows should be extended to 60 to 90 minutes to maximize participation, a longer duration than what is suggested for growing pigs.

The longer sampling time is needed for sows due to their larger size and the fact that fewer sows can access the ropes at any given time when compared to growing pigs, the experts say. The use of two ropes per pen provides adequate access while reducing competition across sows. By combining the two ropes from a single pen before sending them to the lab, you can reduce costs and only pay for one test per pen.

The researchers note that this study showed diagnostic targets, such as a gene, protein or antibody whose presence or absence is used to detect disease, in the pen environment are transferred into pen-based oral fluid samples. This confirms previous report findings in a study conducted by Tarasiuk with finishing pigs .

This explains why pathogens not shed via the mouth (for example, porcine epidemic diarrhea virus, a highly contagious coronavirus that causes severe diarrhea, vomiting, and dehydration in pigs) are consistently detected in oral fluids.

As pigs explore their surroundings, diagnostic targets in the pen environment are picked up; as a result, these targets are deposited in the oral fluid sample and detected by diagnostic testing.

Detecting emerging diseases and monitoring herd health in group-housed sows can be done with ease through oral fluid collection, the researchers say.

Visit the SHIC website to learn more.

6 Ways to Reduce Your Risk of Wildlife Biosecurity Breaches

Tue, 01 Apr 2025 22:37:09 GMT

Wildlife serve an important purpose, but they can also be a major threat to livestock. It’s not possible to keep all wildlife out, but steps can be taken to decrease their activity. Before taking any action, make sure that the wildlife you want to control are not endangered, threatened or protected in your area.

One way you can keep unwanted visitors out is by buttoning up your biosecurity measures to prevent the introduction and spread of infectious diseases and pathogens.

1. Compromised exclusion
When damage occurs to barriers you put up to keep birds away, that can actually create more habitat. Now birds can get in and get behind the barrier which serves as the perfect protection from predators. Nests of wild birds are an indicator that birds are using your Line of Separation for housing.

Robin nest on barn ledge.

(USDA Wildlife Services)

2. Breaches in the foundation
Keep buildings and fences in good repair. Seal holes where wildlife can enter. Anything over 1 square inch is possible for a house sparrow to get into. Repair screens and doors and replace rotting or damaged wood. Nests of wild birds are an indicator that birds are using your Line of Separation for housing.

3. Holes/construction issues
Repair holes in buildings or barns to prevent entry. Regularly check and repair damaged screens on windows and doors

4. Spilled feed
Remove excess feed and feed spills as these can attract bird flocks. It’s not uncommon for birds to defecate while eating. This becomes an opportunity for mice and other rodents to eat the spilled feed and bird poop before heading back into the barn. Keep a broom and lidded garbage container at every feed storage area for quick cleanups.

Feed spillage

(USDA Wildlife Services)

5. Standing water
The virus itself can live in water for months if it’s cold. If you see water, consider it positive for virus. Don’t walk or move equipment through or near standing water— this could track wildlife feces or other contaminants with the virus into your barns.

6. Clutter and tree management
Clutter and trees around the farm provide the perfect habitat for birds and other wildlife to find refuge. Reduce natural food sources by removing fallen fruit and mowing grass often.

Your Next Read: Don’t Be Deceived: Wildlife Pose Serious Threat to Livestock Producers

Why You Need to Pay Attention Now to EPA’s Proposed Rodenticide Mitigation Measures

Fri, 27 Sep 2024 01:18:52 GMT

Out of sight, out of mind. That theory works for a while until it doesn’t, especially when it comes to rodent control.

“Rodenticide use is like using insecticides. If you don’t see any cockroaches, you don’t worry about them. But once you see one, you throw the bomb at it,” says Larry Delozier, director of national poultry account sales for QC Supply.

Similarly, once you see a mouse or rat, it’s likely you have a big problem on your hands , explains Steve Von Haden, Midwest business manager for Motomco.

“Always assume you have rodents, and you should be putting bait out,” Von Haden says. “All agricultural buildings or structures will have rodents of some type. You just don’t want it to get to such high peaks it causes structural damage, diseases and contamination of food sources .”

Pending regulation could mean agriculture loses critically important tools to protect food security. EPA is proposing significant changes to rodenticides that would result in the canceling of products and uses, add more requirements to the labels, and reclassify some products to restricted use pesticides .

“Regardless of whether you are a livestock producer or citrus grower or manager of a golf course, this will have an impact on your ability to effectively manage a destructive farm pest,” says John Walt Boatright, director of government affairs at American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF). “It’s one more challenge in a regulatory environment where challenges continue to grow for the American producer.”

What is EPA Proposing?

On Nov. 29, 2022, the EPA released for public comment new proposed mitigation measures for 11 rodenticides, which if implemented, will have a major impact on all currently available rodenticide products, the Agricultural Retailers Association (ARA) said on its website . The agency’s proposals are the most significant changes to rodenticides in 15 years that will result in the canceling of products and uses, add more requirements to the labels, and reclassify some products to restricted use pesticides, ARA noted.

EPA’s recommended changes are included in four Proposed Interim Decision documents (PIDs) that cover: 1) the seven anticoagulant rodenticides; 2) bromethalin and cholecalciferol; 3) strychnine; and 4) zinc phosphide.

“EPA’s proposal is quite wide-ranging, and it is going to impact any user of rodenticides and how rodenticides are applied,” Boatright explains. “The challenge is many of EPA’s proposed mitigation measures introduce additional challenges for on-farm application. I don’t know that they will have the intended effect that EPA thinks they’ll have.”

Boatright says this should be very concerning for everyone in the agricultural supply chain who apply rodenticides. Michael Formica, chief legal strategist for the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC), says it will also have a negative impact in urban areas where rodent infestation is a major problem.

“This is an example of one area where rural communities can build positive engagement and cooperate with urban communities. As much as rats and rodents are pests on the farm, they are even more so in an urban area,” Formica says. “In the back alleys in DC, you see rats that look like cats racing from one building to another, running around at night. People don’t want to live with them.”

And they shouldn’t have to, Delozier says. Rodent control companies have made effective, safe bait under EPA’s existing stringent restrictions. EPA’s proposed measures will add great cost and will likely be prohibitive for many.

What Does This Mean for Farmers?

If this proposal is enacted, rodenticide users will see many new restrictions.

“The average livestock farmer wouldn’t be able to use them, you would have to go through certification and training in your state,” Formica explains. “If you’ve got a row crop or grain operation, a lot of folks have that certification because they spray pesticides. But most livestock farmers don’t have all those different certifications.”

Certifications would be required annually, which takes a lot of time, paperwork and training.

“If you don’t have that certification, you would need to hire exterminators to come out. That’s expensive and creates its own biosecurity problem because you’re having people come out not just to apply the rat poison, but also pick up the dead rats,” Formica says.

Pick up dead rats? Yes, that’s part of the new measures, too.

“The proposal talks about mandatory carcass searches in the field. That seems to be quite a challenge to expect a farmer or a farm worker to stop what they’re doing and search for rodent carcasses in potentially hundreds or thousands of acres,” Boatright says.

Once the rodent carcasses are found, farmers would be required to not just log them, but also pick them up and dispose of them.

Another limitation of these measures includes the requirement of single-use base stations, which would create a lot of garbage, Formica adds. The bait stations being used today are refillable.

What Will Happen if Rodent Bait Goes Off the Shelves?

“The more regulation you put on farmers, the more resistance you will have and that’s not conducive to the economic engine that is farming and food in the U.S.,” says Mike Slegl, vice president of product sales for QC Supply.

Farmers aren’t misusing product with the intent of controlling other things, Slegl adds. Some believe EPA is rushing to do this because of pressure from environmentalists for Endangered Species Act concerns.

“There is a potential major negative impact of an additional EPA regulation on the true sustainability of livestock production and the livelihood of farms,” Slegl says. “If it’s one more forced hand that overnight becomes more expensive to something they’re already doing, there’s going to be major resistance and people will push towards non-compliance.”

Delozier fears EPA’s rodenticide mitigation measures will ultimately increase the cost of goods to the consumer.

“Whenever we add requirements, there is always a cost that goes into the food system and will eventually cost the consumer more, too,” Delozier says. “Farmers are already using rodenticides that have to be EPA-approved.”

Darrin Karcher, a poultry specialist and associate professor at Purdue University, says it could be a double-edged sword.

“With the larger integrated companies, if they have to pay someone else to do it, they will pay someone because it has to be taken care of. Where it may catch are those individuals doing it themselves who may not have financial depths to pursue having other people take care of application,” Karcher says. “The question becomes, can they find a way to do that?”

An Increased Biosecurity Risk

And what if they can’t? Rodents present a major biosecurity risk for farms. With devastating diseases like Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) in the poultry industry and the threat of deadly foreign animal diseases like African swine fever (ASF) in the pork industry, leaders fear how this could impact the health of the nation’s livestock herds.

“The restricted-use pesticide designation concerns me,” says Matthew Galloway, Midwest sales manager for ag rodenticides with Liphatech Inc. “For the broiler and breeder side of the poultry industry, there are hundreds of thousands of barns all over the U.S. One contract grower often has four or five barns and there may be several thousand barns within each company. If farmers don’t get their license, they will have to hire an outside applicator. Then you run into the risk of biosecurity breaches. We can’t have applicators running through multiple farms over a week’s time, otherwise we’ll really see a massive problem.”

It’s also a major problem if rodents get out of control because farms can’t afford the added cost.

“You can put all the filters you want on the ventilation systems in your barns and be as biosecure of a facility as possible, but if rats can get in and out, they will find a way. They aren’t showering,” Formica says.

What Can You Do?

Every 15 years, pesticides are reviewed by EPA. This rodenticide review is part of a pilot project for EPA as they’re implementing their Endangered Species Act work plan. These mitigation measures seek to achieve compliance with their statutory directives at EPA, following recent court cases directing EPA.

“We will see this approach in reviewing other pesticides as well. Folks need to be prepared to provide input,” he says.

This is a proposed interim decision, Boatright explains. EPA will take comments through Feb. 13 and review them. They will then promulgate a final rule at some point in the future.

“Make your voice heard,” Liphatech’s Galloway says. “We’ve got to do everything we can. Submit comments to EPA.”

Both NPPC and AFBF are gathering feedback and information from its members and will be submitting comments to EPA by the Feb. 13 deadline.

“Weigh in and let elected officials know you value these products. The best thing you can do is call your member of Congress. We’re just coming out of three years of COVID, and there are tremendous human health issues of taking rodenticides off the market,” NPPC’s Formica says.

Read more about the rodent problem.

Telemedicine and African Swine Fever: 5 Reasons to Take a Closer Look

Tue, 19 Oct 2021 23:31:04 GMT

The COVID-19 pandemic and the shortage of food animal veterinarians have catapulted the concept of telemedicine forward. As the threat of African swine fever (ASF) inches closer to the U.S., experts say telemedicine could become an even more useful tool for the pork industry to utilize.

“In the event of an outbreak of ASF in the U.S., veterinary resources will become even more severely strained as biosecurity, distance and logistical barriers will necessitate the use of telemedicine to limit in-person contact with affected swine and ensure timely decision-making,” says Gil Patterson, VMD, chief medical officer at veterinary technology company, VetNOW .

What Exactly is Telemedicine?

When it comes to telemedicine, food animal veterinarians have been practicing the concept for some time even if they didn’t realize it, Patterson explains.

“Veterinarians have been haphazardly sharing pics and sending texts for a long time. Moving those client communications to a formalized telemedicine platform provides a degree of professionalism and robustness that wasn’t there before,” Patterson says.

Telemedicine services can offer a secure platform for veterinarians to conduct farm or pet visits with clients within an established Veterinarian-Client-Patient Relationship (VCPR), and allows for the sharing and storage of medical documents and multimedia (photos/live video) under one umbrella. It also allows the veterinarian to track time and effort, make notes about cases or communication history, and more.

Electronic monitoring of herds and electronic prescriptions are part of telemedicine, too, explains Abbey Canon, DVM, director of public health and communications for the American Association of Swine Veterinarians .

“No doubt we will continue to expand technology that can facilitate telemedicine,” she adds.

The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) has a policy on telemedicine, Canon points out. That policy states, “The AVMA believes that veterinary telemedicine should only be conducted within an existing VCPR, with the exception for advice given in an emergency until that patient can be seen by a veterinarian.”

COVID-19 brought telemedicine into the limelight, but what does the future of this service hold?

“Whether we like it or not, COVID-19 certainly pushed the industry along into the future. Everyone’s comfort level and acceptance of doing meetings on Zoom is forever changed. We’ve gotten savvier about meeting online. We’ve discovered ways to be present and connect with people like never before,” he says.

Telemedicine is not intended to replace in-person visits. Patterson believes it’s critically important for veterinarians to be on the farm. But in between those visits, there are things that might pop up. Telemedicine is a tool to supplement the accessibility and availability of veterinarians in between those on-farm visits, especially when some veterinarians and farms are hundreds of miles apart.

“I see a lot of advantages to telemedicine in terms of helping the animals,” he says. “Better veterinary care and easier access to veterinary care first and foremost is going to equal better animal health.”

So, What Holds Producers Back?

More and more people are seeing the value in telemedicine, Patterson says. Clients understand the advantages of having secure connections and keeping medical records in one place.

“But there is definitely a ‘breaking old habits’ factor that we have run into when vets are used to sending texts, doing FaceTime over the phone – that is a change in behavior which falls on the shoulders of vets to say they are switching over to a more formalized approach to telemedicine,” he says.

Determining the right balance between a quick text about the dose of a medicine versus the need for an online consultation will be an important step as more veterinarians consider including telemedicine services.

As barns get “smarter” with more cameras, monitoring systems, microphones to measure coughing frequency, Patterson says telemedicine is one more tool to bring the veterinarian’s eyes and ears into the barn. Combined with technologies such as these, the value of the virtual visit is enhanced by providing more material to make informed decisions.

“Telemedicine is an emerging industry that is getting better and better at helping veterinarians stay connected with their clients out in the field. It helps promote veterinarian accessibility and access. Especially in the food animal realm where we often deal with biosecurity, distance and weather, which may prevent us from actually getting out there in person,” Patterson says.

Five Ways Telemedicine Can Help in an ASF Outbreak

If an ASF outbreak takes place in the U.S. and is controlled and exports can return within two years, Dermot Hayes, an Iowa State University economist, says it will still result in $15 billion in lost revenue. If it isn’t controlled, he projects that number at $50 billion in lost revenue over 10 years.

To say an ASF outbreak would be devastating is an understatement.

Telemedicine could play an important role in an ASF response strategy. Patterson shares five valuable ways telemedicine can help.

1. A tool to rapidly get “eyes” into a farm when there is a suspected ASF case, while providing oversight and direction of diagnostic sample collection.
2. A platform to support regional business continuity as part of swine movement risk assessments.
3. A way to perform biosecurity auditing of farms to identify at-risk populations.
4. A secure medium to discuss potentially sensitive conversations where high-impact decisions need to be made.
5. An opportunity to share and synchronize information from state and federal diagnostic labs.

“I think telemedicine can be beneficial during a foreign animal disease outbreak,” Canon agrees. “With the additional downtime requirements that will be implemented during an FAD incursion, simply put, we do not have enough swine veterinarians to visit every farm to conduct routine herd health visits, address endemic disease challenges, evaluate animals for movement and collect samples. We might not know exactly how it will look, but telemedicine will likely play a role in an FAD response and recovery.”

Learn More:
AVMA offers additional resources for telemedicine to veterinarians practicing on all species.

Take a look at this interactive map describing the current VCPR laws and regulations surrounding telemedicine in every state provided by the Veterinary Virtual Care Association

Read More from Farm Journal’s PORK:

Telemedicine: Videochats with Veterinarians

Will COVID-19 Speed the Adoption of Technology in the Pork Industry?

Telemedicine Lowers Wait-Time for Rural Health Care