Improving Swine Production

Swine Evaluation Stations have been erected in most of the leading swine producing states of the nation, and like the one in South Dakota, the stations help point the way to improved swine production. Through the efforts of the South Dakota Swine Improvement Association working in cooperation with Animal Science Department, the test station in South Dakota was established in the spring of 1958. A committee consisting of one member from each of the eight organized breed associations makes up a swine evaluation station committee. This committee has developed the rules and regulations used in the operation of the station. The primary objective of the South Dakota Swine Evaluation Station is to help the purebred breeders evaluate potential breeding animals by supplying information they can use in herd improvement, which ultimately leads to improvement of the entire swine population. The commercial producers, who produce most of our market hogs, can then be supplied with information which will aid them in selection of their boars and improvement of their market hogs. Twenty-four pens are in the South Dakota station, which is located at Brookings. Each test pen entry consists of three boar pigs, which are from three different litters but all from the same sire, plus a barrow that is a littermate to one of the boars. The test pigs are fed on a standard growing-finishing ration under similar environmental conditions. Under these uniform conditions and feeding for maximum gains, the differences in performance may be due largely to inheritance except for differences in pre-test treatment which cannot be accounted for nor standardized