Causes of mortality in swine female

Abstract

Annual rate of mortality of sows varies considerably among farms. The increase in mortality, together with culling rate of sows, imply in great losses for the producer. The aim of this work was to evaluate the causes of sows mortality in a farm located in Brazilian Middlewest region. Necropsies of 78 sows were carried out, after their death or euthanasia, during January and February 2006. Mortality rate was 8.1%, considered high if compared to historical rates observed in swine farms. The major causes of death were genito-urinary infections (30.8%), followed by hemorrhagic gastric ulcer (14.1%) and females euthanatizia (14.1%). Farrowing problems and cardiac failure occurred in 10.3% and 10.3% of dead females, respectively. In 5.1% of the sows was not possible to determine the cause of death. Among the females that died 70.5% presented cystitis, 37.2% pyelonephritis and 79.5% presented some degree of stomach ulceration. Among females that died by urinary infection, 54.2% had five or more parities. Females with gastric ulcer had on average of 1.8 parities and 90.9% of them had less than three parities. The body condition score of females submitted to euthanasia was lower than that observed in dead females due to other reasons. More females died when maximum ambient temperature was above 33oC.