Thursday, June 12, 2014

Danes release report on boar castration

European hog farmers face a ban on castration within the next two to five years, so there is keen interest in a report on alternatives from the Danish Center for Food and Agriculture at Aarhus University.

There ought to also be keen interest in Canada and the U.S. because animal welfare organizations are pushing hard for a ban on castration. They have won the battle over crates to house gestating sows and castration is next on their list of priorities.

The Danes say immunological castration may be implemented within two to five years and that it would improve animal welfare compared to surgical castration.

But they said that will still leave issues of aggression and sexual mounting.

At the University of Guelph, Jim Squires continues to make progress with genetic identification of pigs that can reach market weight without lacing pork with the offensive odours that are emitted during cooking.


That raises the possibility of doing nothing to the males and still producing high-quality lean pork at reduced costs because of improved feed efficiency and no castration-trauma setbacks.