Systems for Monitoring and Decision Support with Respect to Sow Longevity

The average lifetime of sows as observed in production herds is primarily influenced by management decisions. Usually the farmer decides to cull a sow, either because he expects that a gilt's average productivity is higher than the marginal productivity of the sow, or because the current number of sows exceeds the production capacity, e.g. in the farrowing department. Several studies have shown economic benefits from low culling rates. Despite this, the average culling rate is still high in (Danish) sow herds. It seems necessary to strengthen the efforts for making the farmer decrease culling rate. One approach is to focus on improving the information available to the farmer, when he makes his decisions. This paper surveys recent efforts for making Decision Support Systems (DSS) for improving the farmer's knowledge of future productivity, his possibilities of management under capacity restrictions, and his possibilities for evaluating different culling strategies.