July2024 - Journal FINAL - Flipbook - Page 10
Nutrition
FOCUS ON YOUR
FEED ORDER
Shantel Vis
Feed Order Manager
Pipestone Nutrition
Shantel grew up on a farm in southwest Minnesota, raising Simmental
cow/calf pairs and managing a feedlot and row crops. A South Dakota
State University graduate, she joined PIPESTONE in 2013 and gained
experience in various roles. She now serves as the Feed Order Manager
for Pipestone Nutrition.
Ordering feed for your pigs is an essential
responsibility on the farm. It may seem straightforward,
but it plays a critical role in both the performance of
your animals and their overall health. Incorrect feed
orders can not only disrupt feeding schedules but also
pose serious biosecurity risks. Here are a few tips and
tricks to consider before placing your next feed order:
Proper Inventory Management
Reading bins is a tedious task, but crucial to planning
an appropriate feed order. Proper bin readings reduce
the chance of running out of feed, improve feed quality
by ensuring the oldest feed is used orst, and eliminate
feed delivery errors. Reading feed bins and managing
your inventory is an essential for proper feed ordering.
Logistics and Delivery
Establish a delivery schedule with your feed mill to
maintain biosecurity standards. It will set you up for a
regular schedule to read your bin, and provide your mill
the opportunity to follow the biosecurity pyramid. Below
is an example of a health biosecurity pyramid. The goal
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is to maintain a delivery schedule that allows high health
sites, sow farms, to receive feed either at the beginning
of the week or delivered by dedicated trucks. Level
2, healthy grow onish sites, should be after sow farms
and before any diseased challenged sites to maintain
health status. Level 3 and Level 4 are shown as either
recovering from a previous disease issue or are currently
experiencing a health challenge. This structured
approach helps in maintaining the health status of your
herd.
Record Keeping 3 Understanding Daily
Consumption
Understanding daily consumption trends involves
carefully monitoring and analyzing the feed intake
patterns over time. By consistently tracking daily feed
consumption, either manually or with automated
systems, farmers can gather data that reveals important
trends. These trends may vary according to different
stages of production. For example, during lactation,
