We have two piglets with hernias this time around. One of them is an umbilical hernia...nothing we really worry about. The other is a scrotal hernia. This one has made it impossible to castrate the piglet and thus limits his usefulness as a butcher pig.
I have been doing some research into the causes of hernias and found a good article describing them. Here is the link.
http://www.thepigsite.com/articles/1/pig-health-and-welfare/2320/hernias-in-growing-pigs
Apparently, hernias are considered part genetic defect, part living condition. I don't think that our piglets were subjected to specifically dirty conditions, but I did read somewhere that said umbilical hernias tend to happen when piglets are cold and use those abdominal muscles to hunch over for warmth. This would certainly fit with our piglets as there was not a substantial enough shelter for them and we did not run a heat lamp this year due to the amount of energy it consumed.
The scrotal hernia is less likely to have anything to do with environment. Interestingly, the article mentions that this usually happens on the left side, and that is the case with our pig...named "Nuts" for obvious reasons. I hadn't read about scrotal hernias but made an educated guess to abstain from castration because I was concerned that it might complicate things. It sounds like that was the right choice as scrotal hernias make castration nearly impossible.
We will probably end up keeping Nuts until butcher age. My best plan is to isolate him (and maybe a buddy) from the big pigs, feed him free choice so that he grows as quickly as possible, and butcher at as young an age as we can. This will avoid the "taint" that may come with an uncastrated male. It will also lessen our chances of mortality prior to butcher as he will only have to grow for a few months. My hope is to get him to a reasonable butcher weight by four or five months of age. This should be completely do-able.
I will take pictures of the hernias soon and add them to this post so that people can see what a hernia might look like. It is different than the sub dermal hematomas we see on a regular basis after a piglet has been squished (usually against a wall so the hematoma ends up on a shoulder or hip).
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