Swine Grist - Winter 2018

Swine Grist

A PERIODIC NEWSLETTER PRODUCED

BY GRAND VALLEY FORTIFIERS LTD. VOLUME 5, ISSUE 4 WINTER 2018

Dear Friends, Summer 2018 in Ontario was one of the most beautiful, hot summers we’ve seen in a long time. Thankfully we were also blessed to receive rain in July after a significant dry spell in May and June. Our friends in Alberta had fairly dry summer and some areas even experienced drought conditions. In traveling to Alberta and Manitoba this week to visit with our Fortified staff and take in the Prairie Livestock Expo I was thankful to hear that despite these challenging conditions most producers were able to reap a fairly good harvest. Molds and Mycotoxins are proving to be a significant challenge in southwestern Ontario this fall but we hope the prairies will be spared from this plight.

If you are facing a toxin challenge on your farm, take special note of Bruce Schumann’s article entitled Corn Harvest 2018. We are very excited to announce the opening of our new Farmers Pharmacy Rx in response to the changes in antibiotic regulations in Canada, that came into effect on December 1st. This Pharmacy has primarily been created to serve producers in eastern Canada but opportunities may open up for the prairies as well. We have also included two health updates from veterinarians in response to the increasing concerns around African Swine Fever and the outbreak in China.

Wishing you and your family a wonderful Christmas as you celebrate the birthday of Jesus our Saviour.

God bless from the management and staff of Grand Valley Fortifiers.

SWINE HEALTH UPDATE

by: ED METZGER, DVM South West Vets

W

ith 2018 quickly winding to a close, we reflect on another year filled with challenges and opportunities in the Ontario and Canadian swine industry. With the arrival of African Swine Fever in China and Belgium, the North American swine industry is very concerned about the prospect of this virus landing on our shores.

This is yet another wake-up call to reinforce all biosecurity protocols at an industry level and for each and every hog producer.

The fears about African Swine Fever (ASF) are, to a certain extent, warranted. This virus survives extremely well in the environment and is transmitted through all bodily fluids of swine (feces, saliva) and in uncooked meat products. ASF has quickly moved throughout most regions within China. ASF has been found in feed ingredients in China, as well as in uncooked pork products found at airports in neighbouring countries. Dr. Scott Dee and the team at Pipestone Applied Research have concluded it is very likely ASF can survive in feed ingredients being imported from China into North America.

That being said, there have been no reported cases in North America to date, and we continue to close biosecurity gaps on an industry level to prevent its introduction. It goes without saying that the introduction of ASF in North America would be a detrimental impact to us all.

PRRS virus was once again a big disease threat in Ontario in 2018.

Between September 2017 and October 2018, we had approximately 13% of the Ontario sow herd break with PRRS, representing ~40, 000 sows worth of production. Unexpectedly, a number of these breaks occurred

Alberta / Saskatchewan 1-866-610-5770 Manitoba 1-866-626-3933

through the summer months when historically PRRS pressure is lowest.

We have also seen the introduction of new or variant strains which are much more virulent than we typically have seen in Ontario. Certain strains of 1-8-4 have had very significant clinical impact, particularly on abortions, sow mortality, and preweaning mortality.

In 2017, Swine Health Ontario began a refocus on PRRS, specifically looking at sow site breaks and coupling this data with anonymous reporting of strains and clinical impact data, which is uncharted territory in the Ontario industry. This led to the formation of the Sow Site Incidence Project, from which the above information was generated. This tool has been extremely helpful over the past year and shows promise on being able to flag highly virulent strains and better focus containment and elimination efforts.

Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea (PED) virus has been a good news story in Ontario in 2018, with only 3 new sow herd breaks reported. In Ontario, all but 2 sites in the province are negative, or in the process of eliminating.

PED still remains active throughout our cull sow and BBQ assembly chain, and this still poses a large risk to the Ontario industry.

Seneca Valley Virus (SVV) also remains alive and active at the level of our assembly barns. To date, we have managed to keep this virus contained to assembly sites and there has been no on farm cases of SVV reported in Ontario. This is a testament to our industries efforts on biosecurity, and truly a tincture of luck. Once again, our transport companies have stepped up to the plate and are doing an awesome job at making truck sanitation and overall biosecurity a priority. SVV, if found at any of our federal or provincial packers will result in an immediate shutdown of that plant until confirmatory testing is completed. This will occur because SVV is clinically indistinguishable from Foot and Mouth Disease, which is federally reportable.

Clearly, having any of our major federal packers shut down even for a 48Ian Ross, President & CEO | Jim Ross, Chairman Clarke Walker, VP & COO Dr. Martin Clunies, Senior Monogastric Nutritionist David Ross/Patti Bobier, Publishers

hour period (if not longer) would be extremely disruptive.

Like all things in life, there is an opportunity in every struggle, and although there are many health threats on our doorstep or on the horizon, we have the ability to minimize their impact and/or keep them out altogether. We will continue to monitor the growing global situation with African Swine Fever and will remain vigilant. Always remember biosecurity starts and ends at the barn door. n

INTRODUCTION OF FARMERS PHARMACY RX

by: IAN ROSS President & CEO GVF Group of Companies

T

he GVF group of companies is pleased to announce the creation and launch of Farmers Pharmacy Rx Limited. This brand new, first in Ontario, exclusive livestock medicine dispensary has arrived in conjunction with the enactment of regulatory changes surrounding antibiotics that affect all livestock producers.

Farmers Pharmacy Rx Limited is a 4,500 sq/ft “lock and leave” pharmacy housed within the Farmers Farmacy facility located on Dobbie Drive in Cambridge, Ontario. This pharmacy has been created to provide producers with ready, easy access to topical, water soluble, injectable and feed antibiotics and medications — all important tools for farmers raising and caring for livestock and poultry.

In order to purchase livestock antibiotics through Farmers Pharmacy Rx Limited, a producer must first obtain a prescription from the veterinarian with whom they have an active “vet client patient relationship”.

Farmers Pharmacy Rx Limited has established close, open working relationships with key swine and poultry veterinary clinics in Ontario in order to facilitate the flow of prescriptions to producers and to this new livestock medicine pharmacy. Prescriptions may be provided to Farmers Pharmacy Rx Limited by fax or email (contact information below) from a veterinary clinic or from a producer with veterinarian confirmation. Once received and dispensed by our licensed pharmacist, packaged goods (water soluble, injectable, topical) medications may be delivered by courier direct to farm. Courier deliveries within the province of Ontario will be received the next day. Prescriptions including (full bags) of feed medications will be dispensed in the same manner and may be delivered using the Grand Valley Fortifiers fleet of premix delivery vehicles. These vehicles follow strict bio-security protocols for all of their deliveries. All direct to farm deliveries will require a producer signature indicating that they have received their prescribed medication products. Of course, producers also have the option of picking up their prescription orders at the Farmers Farmacy facility during regular business hours.

Medicated complete feed or premix will continue to be available through Grand Valley Fortifiers or the producer’s current feed supplier. A valid prescription however, will now be required to purchase medicated feed, nursery feeds and premixes.

Initially, Farmers Pharmacy Rx Limited will carry the historical “over the counter” (OTC) feed antibiotics, water soluble, injectable and topical medications. Over time this product portfolio will expand to include more of the traditional prescription-only water soluble and injectable medications as the number prescriptions fulfilled by Farmers Pharmacy Rx Limited increases.

Farmers Pharmacy Rx will be open and able to receive and fulfill prescriptions from Monday to Friday, 10:00am–3:00pm, while being closed on weekends and holidays. Prescription orders may be picked up at the

Farmers Farmacy® facility from 8:00am – 5:30pm. We are pleased to provide livestock and poultry producers with a choice as to where they purchase the antibiotics they need to successfully raise their herds and flocks.

Please give us a call at Farmers Farmacy with any further questions about this new method of dispensing prescription medications.

1-866-527-6229.

All scripts can be faxed directly to Farmers Pharmacy Rx at 519-603-3535 or emailed to scripts@FarmersPharmacyRx.com Address Farmers Farmacy & Farmers Pharmacy Rx Limited 455 Dobbie Drive, Cambridge Ontario N1T 1T1 We do wish to thank the producers and producer groups who through their requests for the on-going opportunity to purchase antibiotics through various vendors, spurred Farmers Farmacy® on to pursue the creation of Farmers Pharmacy Rx Limited. We also wish to thank those who work in the pharmaceutical, veterinary medicine, pharmacy and swine, poultry and ruminant livestock sectors that assisted greatly as we navigated the new livestock medicine regulations that took effect on December 1st, 2018. n

CORN HARVEST 2018

by: BRUCE SCHUMANN B.Sc. (Agric.), M.Sc., Monogastric Nutritionist, Grand Valley Fortifiers Ltd.

W

e are beginning to see the detrimental effects of mold and the toxins they produce from this year’s corn harvest. Molds have very minimal requirements in order to grow and flourish, namely a carbon/nitrogen source (grain), oxygen and moisture. This year a number of regions in Ontario saw moisture patterns at the wrong time in the growth cycle of corn, which has produced an abundance of mold growth. There are over 200,000 known species of mold. Three major types of molds infect grains, Aspergillus, Fusarium and Penicillin molds. When molds get stressed they produce mycotoxins. Aspergillus produces aflatoxin & ochratoxin A, Penicillin produces ochratoxin A & Rubratoxin and the major mold infecting grain in Ontario is Fusarium, which produces the “Big-Three” toxins we are most familiar with, namely Zearalenone, DON and T-2 toxin. Below (Table 1) is the average DON, Zearalenone, T2, Fumonisin and Aflatoxin levels on the 2018 corn crop submitted to GVF for analysis.

Table 1 – Average toxin levels for 2018 crop corn submitted for mycotoxin analysis

DON Average Zeralenone T2 Average Fumonisins Aflatoxins

(ppm) Average (ppb) (ppb) Average (ppb) Average (ppb)

3.36 164 45 121 0.14 Number of Samples 187 177 177 174 174 Min 0 0 0 0 0 Max 29.66 2950 1330 4300 2 5 Unless the nutrients required for mold growth (ex. oxygen) are removed, molds can still remain active during storage and will alter the nutrient composition of the stored grains. This can significantly reduce both the fat content of feedstuffs (metabolizable and net energy) as well as significantly alter the amino acid composition (the building blocks for protein deposition) in the grain. This could cause you to overestimate the nutri-

ents in your feed, resulting in lower growth and/or feed conversion. There are products in the industry (formalin and acid-based products), which can be incorporated into grain during storage, which will prevent further mold growth. While these ingredients can kill the mold, they do little to nothing to the toxins that have already been produced.

There has not been a single mycotoxin identified to date that does not negatively impact immunity in some way. With the recent changes to reduce antimicrobial usage and more dependence on vaccines to fight off diseases (ileitis, e-coli, etc.), we need to make sure that our vaccines and circulating titre levels are sufficient to prevent disease from occurring. Table 2 provides some general symptoms for the 3 major toxins.

Table 2 Symptoms of Mycotoxicoses in swine Vomitoxin (DON)

Zearalenone

T-2

Reduced feed intake

Swollen vulva, vaginal prolapse

Reduced feed intake

Higher death loss, abortions

Impaired immune system

Poor reproductive performance Hyper-estrogenism

Increased disease rates Intestinal hemorrhages

Reduced gain Impaired immune function

One of the first steps to reducing the effect of mycotoxins on your farm is to know what you are up against. We recommend you do a complete toxin analysis on your corn, not just a single toxin. Most feed mills use a snap Elisa or strip test. These are usually limited to a single toxin (often DON) and are not very accurate compared to other methods. We do have pockets of zearalenone out in the industry and toxins potentiate each other. Most laboratories you send samples to will use a more sensitive Elisa test, measuring with a colour spectrometer. Grand Valley Fortifiers sends our samples to Activation Laboratories where they perform high performance liquid chromatography-mass spec-mass spec (HPLC-MSMS) testing. What that means to you is that you get a very accurate account of your toxins.

So, how do we mitigate the risk of using mycotoxin infected grain on our production units? Here are a number of suggestions you can implement on your farm: 1. Test your fields or grains prior to receiving them – if there is a toxin issue, consider incorporating a mold inhibitor.

2. Grain cleaners are available in the marketplace which significantly reduce mold and ergot contaminated grain. This can even be performed post-harvest.

3. If you have multiple species on-farm, consider using a higher percentage of infected grain in species with a higher tolerance for known toxins 4. If you have a farrow-to-finish operation consider using a higher proportion of infected grain in animals with a higher tolerance for known toxins 5. Dilute with clean grains – Use barley, oats, wheat, mixed grain, shorts and bakery meal to dilute your corn because all of these ingredients are relatively “clean” in 2018.

6. Use some form of mycotoxin control in your premix/feed. A Grand Valley Fortifiers Swine Specialists would be happy to assist you with this.

There are many different products in the marketplace, which have been incorporated into mycotoxin contaminated diets. Many of the clay products however are only effective against aflatoxin and provide very little to no effect on DON or zearalenone. Other adsorbents (such as yeast products), contain glucomannans, which can have varying levels of affinity for toxins. Usually a product with a strong affinity for one toxin does not usually have a strong affinity for another toxin. This can still result in negative performance if there are multiple toxins. The other

Swine Grist concern is that while adsorbents may bind to toxins in the early portion of the gasto-intestinal system, where the pH of the gut is acidic, those same bonds weaken in a basic to neutral environment like the small and large intestine. This means that the toxins will now be released in the hind gut. DON is a water soluble toxin, and the majority of water absorption occurs in the large intestine of the pig. This provides a direct route for mycotoxin absorption into the animal. This may be why we see little to no benefit to using an adsorbent when we have DON issues in our feeds. The most effective way to reduce mycotoxins is via microbial detoxification, similar to what we see in occurring in the gut microbiota of the chicken as it denatures DON to DOM-1 (a less harmful metabolite).

The toxins are permanently changed not just held and that means that their toxic effect is either significantly reduced or eliminated.

Figure 1.0 are the results from a trial where we compared the performance of pigs being fed a diet with no mycotoxin contamination compared to being fed mycotoxin-contaminated feed (negative control) with the addition of a clay product, or a preservative or our Assure® product.

Figure 1.0 Relative change of treatment on weight gain and feed conversion compared to control Pigs fed our Assure® product came closest to the control group for weight gain and showed an improvement in feed conversion over negative control fed pigs. For more information on how Grand Valley Fortifiers can help you navigate through this difficult toxin year, please contact your swine specialist. n

THE HORROR OF AFRICAN SWINE FEVER IN EUROPE IS NOW HITTING CHINA

by: DR. JOHN CARR

F

ollowing the introduction in 2007 in the country of Georgia, African Swine Fever Virus is now well established in the West of Russia, the Baltic region, Ukraine, Poland, Romania and then Czech Republic and Belgium — well into the European Union. The pathogen continues to fan out in all directions.

The disaster of August 2018 was that China, with 46% of the world’s pig population, reported its first cases. China is a major importer of British pork and we must do what we can to protect our customer.

The following two web addresses are very helpful to monitor the current situation and can be received on your phone through the App store (by searching OIE): • http://www.oie.int/wahis_2/public/wahid.php/Diseaseinformation/Diseaseoutbreakmaps • http://www.oie.int/wahis_2/public/wahid.php/Countryinformation/Diseasetimeseries African Swine Fever (ASF) is a large DNA virus which is closely related to pox viruses and some arthropod viruses. There are at least 22 different

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types of the virus. The virus is an arthropod-bourne virus naturally living in the soft body tick Carios (Ornithodorus) moubata, which lives in Africa.

Unfortunately, it is also able to replicate in pigs- Sus scrofa, (the wild and domestic pig) but also the Wart Hog, Giant Forest Hog, Red River hog and even the Peccaries of the America’s.

The clinical signs of ASF can be dramatic but they also resemble a number of other conditions the most important in Asia is Classical Swine Fever.

The key feature is that pigs die en masse.

While many pigs die suddenly, some survive for a week (2–10 days); pigs may present with a variety of clinical signs: • High temperature – usually causing sows to abort, which is often the first dramatic sign • The pigs stop eating • Pens are unusually quiet and pigs look depressed • There may be skin color changes with red blotches • Initial constipation, giving way to diarrhea Dramatic haemorrhage is a feature at the nose and rectum, with blood spots evident on the skin. The signs can take 3 weeks to develop in the pig following infection.

Farmers have to realise that ASF affects pigs of all age groups, whereas most of the other conditions which may produce some of the similar signs, do not – this is the best way to rule it out quickly.

Some pigs will survive ASF, including wild boars. They are then a huge risk factor for spread of the disease because they remain carriers for the rest of their lives and can infect other pigs at any time.

Control and treatment

There is no treatment for ASF. Currently, there is no vaccine and although there are trials being carried out, there has been much research in this area and very little progress made. Twenty-two different strains of virus make life very difficult. A vaccine against the type II strain would be an invaluable tool in the control of the disease.

Stopping the spread of the virus

A pig is infected by eating infected pig products. All body secretions of infected pigs have large amounts of virus present, including faeces, urine, blood and any part of the carcass of an infected pig. The virus can survive for years in meat products and for 2–3 weeks in faeces. Dead wild boar act as a reservoir for other curious wild boars. To control the virus regional stamping out is practiced over a 10km zone around the affected animal(s).

When biosecurity is poor, pig products can be moved by vehicles, equipment, clothing and boots. Pig movement is always a serious risk, especially moving pigs to the slaughterhouse to try and salvage something from the decimation on the farm. Disinfectants will destroy the virus — sodium hydroxide, hypochlorites, formalin, phenols and iodine compounds are all effective. Even soap will kill the virus.

Disinfectants must be used at the correct concentration, but the biggest issue is that the surface to be disinfected must be clean. Cleaning takes time, patience and attention to detail is vital if the process is to be effective. With ASF mediocrity will not be enough.

CLEAN IT BEFORE YOU DISINFECT IT!

whether you have just one pig or 50 thousand. If you suspect a problem, ask your veterinarian — do not pretend it’s not happening.

With no vaccine, we have to rely on prompt detection and slaughter to control this terrible disease. We cannot wait for science to save us.

Do not allow employees to bring pork products on the farm and always wash your hands in soap and water before handling the pigs. n Congratulations to all Topigs Norsvin producers who received the top production awards on November 28, 2018 in Stratford, ON.

See the chart below for details on the winners and their production achievements.

East West Farrowing Rate 93.1% Keho Lake Colony (AB) 96.04% RFW Weber (ON) Winner 94.63% Runner-up Tenth Line Swine Inc. (ON) 91.4% Albion Ridge Colony (AB) Pigs Born Alive / Litter 14.23 Cool Spring Colony (MB) 14.45 Silver Corners Inc. (ON)* Winner 14.11 Three Hills Colony (AB) 14.31 Runner-up Hopestead Farms (ON)* Pigs Weaned / Sow / Year 30.62 Cool Spring Colony (MB) 32.87 Hihojo Farm (ON) Winner 31.60 Runner-up Tenth Line Swine Inc. (ON) 29.56 Keho Lake Colony (AB) Herds of 501-1,200 Sows Farrowing Rate Winner

Wohlgemuth Farms (NS)*

93.6%

Tied at 93.8%

Runner-up

Van de Bruinhorst Acres Inc. (ON)

Evergreen Colony (MB)* & Fal-Ric Farms (MB)

92.7%

Huron Colony (MB)

93.4%

Pigs Born Alive/litter

Van de Bruinhorst Acres Winner Inc. (ON) Runner-up A-C DeGroot Farms (ON)*

14.22

Evergreen Colony (MB)*

15.29

14.18

Blumengart Colony (MB)

14.77

32.01 Evergreen Colony (MB)* RFW KSU (ON) Winner 30.53 Blumengart Colony (MB) Runner-up A-C DeGroot Farms (ON)* Herds >1200 sows Farrowing Rate

32.69 32.21

Pigs Weaned/Sow/Year

Winner

Petervale Farms (ON)

90.2%

Sunnybrook Swine Inc. Site 93.5% 1 (MB) 93.4% Rhineland Pork (MB)

89.8% Runner-up Crimson Lane Farms (ON) Pigs Born Alive/litter 13.92 Morris Piglets South (MB) Crimson Lane Farms (ON) Winner 13.11 Morris Piglets North (MB) Runner-up RFW Burnside (ON) Pigs Weaned/Sow/Year 30.16 Rhineland Pork (MB) Crimson Lane Farms (ON) Winner

Runner-up Petervale Farms (ON)

29.72

14.46 14.31 30.50

Sunnybrook Swine Inc. Site 30.34 1 (MB)

* Producers GVF has had the privilege of providing sound nutrition for in 2018

Thought for the Day

Outcome

African Swine Fever is rapidly becoming the next great, and probably the greatest, notifiable threat to the European and Asian pig herd; its effects are potentially catastrophic — worse than PMWS or PED. Farms can recover from PED, but farms cannot recover, without depopulation and lots of hard work, from ASF. This is a problem for all of us because even if a farm practices exemplary biosecurity, a case of ASF within 10 km is likely to result in government action to slaughter the pigs.

Stopping the spread relies heavily on the surveillance and openness from the whole farm health team. This is not a disease you can hide

The Long Awaited Visitation And the Angel said to them, “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is Christ the Lord.”

Luke 2:10 - 11 Blessed Christmas from our GVF family to yours