During her PhD studies, Jeanet Francisca Maria Winters researched alternative strategies to reduce postweaning stress in pigs. The current conventional weaning practice, where piglets are abruptly separated from their sow, mixed with unfamiliar pigs, and moved to a novel pen environment, causes stress and negatively impacts pig welfare. Jeanet studied whether using an alternative sow hybrid, that gives birth to fewer but heavier piglets could increase pig robustness towards abrupt weaning, and whether keeping intact litters of pigs in farrowing pens for loose-housed sows after weaning, thus in the pen of birth, could alleviate some of the negative effects of the abrupt weaning practice.

The new research findings contribute to the understanding of postweaning stress in pigs and how alternative management strategies can reduce the postweaning stress and improve pig welfare in conventional production systems.

The PhD study was completed at Department of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, Research unit Behaviour, Stress and Welfare, Faculty of Technical Sciences, Aarhus University.

This summary was prepared by the PhD student.

Time: Wednesday, 11^th September 2024 at 10:00.
Place: Building 8814, Auditorium, Department of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, Aarhus University, Blichers Allé 20, 8830 Tjele
Title of PhD thesis: Reducing postweaning stress in pig -trough increasing weaning weight, by using an alternative sow hybrid, and housing intact litters in the pen of birth
Contact information: Jeanet F.M. Winters, e-mail: jeanet.winters@anivet.au.dk, tel.: +45 61756315

Members of the assessment committee:
Associate Professor Irene Camerlink, Department of Animal Behaviour, Institute of Genetics and Animal Biotechnology of the Polish Academy of Sciences

Professor (emeritus) Jan Erik Lindberg, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences 

Professor Peter T. Thomsen, Research unit Management and Modelling, Department of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, Aarhus University, Denmark (chair)

Main supervisor:
Professor Lene Juul Pedersen, Department of Animal Sciences and Veterinary Sciences, Aarhus University, Denmark

Co-supervisor:
Senior Researcher Nuria Canibe, Research unit Gut and Host Health, Department of Animal and Veterinary Sciences, Aarhus University, Denmark

Language: The PhD dissertation will be defended in English

It will be possible to view the exam Click here to join the meeting

The defence is public.
The PhD thesis is available for reading at the Graduate School of Technical Sciences/GSTS,

Ny Munkegade 120, building 1521, 8000 Aarhus C.