Entire Litter Dead
Posted: Fri May 11, 2012 4:41 am
Yesterday was a bad day. I went out to feed in the morning to find my gilt had farrowed overnight, but all the piglets were dead. Her afterbirth was out already but she was just laying there all day seeming to have a hard time moving, until in the evening she got up and got some water and ate a little. I think she was mourning. After finding the scene, I bagged 2 of the piglets and put them in the 'outside' fridge and talked to the vet. I went back to the vet at 2:00 for the necropsy. I watched the process and listened and asked questions to try to determine what might cause this, and just how common this might be. On the first piglet there were crushed ribs, broken near the spine and with obvious damage to the internals and a break in the skin where the ribs had punctured. This one had been crushed. The next step was to check to see if it had been alive, so he took a lung and put it in water, and it floated, so it was determined it had taken a breath. Everything else was of no clue. No cysts, or abnormal growths, simply a crushed piglet. On number 2 there was no signs of crushing, all the internals looked normal, the lung sunk in water. It had never taken a breath, there were no blockages in the trachia, no growths, or cysts. The only thing even remotely not normal was a slight dark discoloration of the kidneys. The dark areas were kind of radial, and not over the entire organ. The vet was not sure if this was a problem or not. We sent samples of the organs out for testing.
I was certainly thinking a farrowing crate might have been nice last night. I thought she was a couple days early, until I re-looked at the calendar, and saw February, so she was maybe 4 days early. If I had stayed out there and watched over it all, maybe I could have saved some, maybe not, but there might have been a better outcome. I just didn't think it was 'time'.
She is a RW that was bred to a Large Black boar. She is over 2-1/2 years old, and this was her first litter. When I get the results back from the lab I will add that to this. Some days really are coal.
Just realized I never added the results from the lab. There was no diseases found.
I was certainly thinking a farrowing crate might have been nice last night. I thought she was a couple days early, until I re-looked at the calendar, and saw February, so she was maybe 4 days early. If I had stayed out there and watched over it all, maybe I could have saved some, maybe not, but there might have been a better outcome. I just didn't think it was 'time'.
She is a RW that was bred to a Large Black boar. She is over 2-1/2 years old, and this was her first litter. When I get the results back from the lab I will add that to this. Some days really are coal.
Just realized I never added the results from the lab. There was no diseases found.