Steven Hoff

1. IntroductionPre-weaning mortality (PWM) is a major economic and productivity challenge for the pig industry. Recent trends for piglets born alive per litter are increasing in the US, while piglets weaned per litter have stayed stable over the past five years [1]; hence, indicating an increasing PWM. PWM is typically greatest during the neonatal phase, or within the first few days after birth in ...

Does It Make a Difference If a New Pig Barn is Built In an Area With Existing Barns? A model, called the Community Assessment Model for Odor Dispersion (CAM), was developed to predict receptor odor exposure from multiple swine production sources. The intended use of CAM was to provide a tool for evaluating the odor exposure to receptors in a community when siting new swine production systems and ...

INTRODUCTIONPig production around the globe has become very sophisticated with well-controlled environments that, if controlled properly, maximize animal well-being and production efficiency. The major thermal challenge in pig housing is economical mitigation of heat stress. Unlike cold weather periods where relatively inexpensive heating devices can be used to optimize thermal ...

INTRODUCTION Gas, odor, and particulate concentrations and emissions have been, and will continue to be, targeted components of livestock and poultry production systems. Local units of government (counties and townships) have or are considering the establishment of setback requirements from rural residences and livestock operations to prevent odor and other nuisance complaints ...

INTRODUCTIONLameness in swine, poultry, horses, and cattle have a large negative economical impact to livestock producers (Corr et al., 2003). Multiple definitions of lameness are used. Merriam-Webster (2008) defines lameness as “having a body part and especially a limb so disabled as to impair freedom of movement” while Wells (1984) defines lameness as ”impaired moveme ...