Water is one of the most basic needs for pigs. However, knowledge of how much water the modern, highly productive sow really needs is limited. Sows today are more productive than ever, which also means their water requirements have increased. For example, modern sows produce an average of 15 kg of milk daily during lactation when nursing 14 piglets (and some herds are already experimenting with sows nursing 18 piglets).
As the sows’ work schedule becomes more challenging, they also need more water in order to keep up. So, ensuring sufficient, good quality water also contributes to happy, healthy sows in your herd – and better animal welfare.
Below, you can find the newest recommendations from SEGES Innovation on how you can better manage drinking water in your pig production.
Clean and cool water
Clean
Drinking water for pigs must be physically, chemically, and microbiologically correct. Water testing frequency depends on water sources. If the water is derived from well water, surface water, or pipeline water, it is recommended to test the water source four times per year. A study showed that herds with a lot of diarrhea had a lower water quality [6].
Cool
The Danish recommendation is 12 ̊C from the faucet/valve. It might not be possible to keep the water as cool as the recommendations (especially in warmer climates), but the cooler the drinking water, the more your pigs will drink.
Sufficient water capacity
Recheck your water capacity.
Can all the pigs in your farm drink water at the same time?
Choose the right drinker for your pigs
And more importantly, ensure easy accessibility and correct position of the drinker.
Control the water waste
Check your water systems (both indoor and outdoor), pipes and drinkers routinely.
A leak of 1 L/min raises water consumption by the same amount as increasing your pig herd by 22.5 sows (including progeny) or 240 finisher places!
A drinker leaking at 90 drips per minute will waste around 29 L of water per day [8].
Checking the water system will ensure the system works correctly – and can save you a lot of money.
Modern sows’ water usage and drinking patterns
If you can identify the sow’s normal drinking pattern, then you can identify the changes.
That means, you can take action faster.
Result from a pilot study by SEGES Innovation [5] showed the following patterns:
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- Sick sows drink less water than healthy sows, so, by monitoring a sow’s drinking pattern daily, you can identify sick sows and treat them faster.
- Sows’ water usage decreased prior to farrowing. So, this is a sign for you that it is time to turn on the heat lamp in the covered creep area. Instead of just turning on all the heat lamps on a fixed day of the week. In the end, you will save energy.
- When feeding dry feed, sows with no stillborn had more frequent water breaks that the sows with one or multiple stillborn. This indicates that encouraging your sows to drink more often during farrowing can decrease the number of stillborn.
- For herds with wet feeding, the sows with the highest daily water usage weaned more piglets. It is possible that an increase in water consumption can result in an increase in milk yield, which can increase piglet growth and reduce mortality.
