BRAND NEW OTRADA DUROC: excellent sire line for your production
Historical background
Otrada Breeding Farm, Bogoroditskoe, Lipetsk Region, Russia
The Duroc breed was initially developed in the northeast of the United States in the middle of the 19th Century. 150 years ago the breed was already renowned for its superior growth traits and distinctive meat quality.
In the late 1970s Duroc populations were established in Denmark to answer better the meat and carcass quality requirements for the production of Danish Bacon destined for export markets, primarily in the UK (where Bacon and Eggs became the typical breakfast meal at the turn of the 20th Century).
Years of genetic improvement have made the Danish Duroc one of the most advanced pig population in the world with superior results in growth and carcass traits compared to most of its competitors.
In the late 1970s Duroc populations were established in Denmark to answer better the meat and carcass quality requirements for the production of Danish Bacon destined for export markets, primarily in the UK (where Bacon and Eggs became the typical breakfast meal at the turn of the 20th Century).
Years of genetic improvement have made the Danish Duroc one of the most advanced pig population in the world with superior results in growth and carcass traits compared to most of its competitors.
Modern requirements for Duroc
Still, the pig production world is changing at a steady fast pace. An increasing number of pig producers wish to produce heavier finisher pigs (130 kg) with an optimum leanness while keeping excellent performances of growth and feed efficiency. Modern pig production takes more and more place in large-scale farms with conditions that can be challenging. This means that to satisfy our clients' demands we need to produce a terminal boar that, above its excellent technical characteristics, provides extra robustness to fit the diverse production systems of our clients.
By collaborating with PIC we have connected our genetic herds to the PIC Danish Lines issued from the populations of Møllevang Genetics (which was one of the best nucleus farm of the former Danish Pig Breeding system). This has improved the quality of the animals that we propose to our clients.
The size of the Duroc Elite populations, including the Otrada population, is close to 4 000 Duroc sows. This significantly increases the opportunities to find the genetically superior animals that drive the improvement of the whole population, compared to smaller nucleus populations. It is at least twice the size of any another genetic company breeding a Duroc line.
This population is spread in different countries (Denmark, Northern Ireland, USA, Spain and Russia so far), which has several advantages for our clients:
By collaborating with PIC we have connected our genetic herds to the PIC Danish Lines issued from the populations of Møllevang Genetics (which was one of the best nucleus farm of the former Danish Pig Breeding system). This has improved the quality of the animals that we propose to our clients.
The size of the Duroc Elite populations, including the Otrada population, is close to 4 000 Duroc sows. This significantly increases the opportunities to find the genetically superior animals that drive the improvement of the whole population, compared to smaller nucleus populations. It is at least twice the size of any another genetic company breeding a Duroc line.
This population is spread in different countries (Denmark, Northern Ireland, USA, Spain and Russia so far), which has several advantages for our clients:
- Bringing more security for deliveries of boars in case of health problems in a specific geographical zone.
- Assessing the animals under different circumstances brings more robustness to the indexes calculated throughout the population.
A Brand New Duroc with PIC and Otrada
Combining a constant import of elite semen from the highest ranked animals possible in the PIC Danish Lines population with the increased size of our Duroc population and with the improvements in our data collection system, Otrada is ready to propose boars of high genetic value, calculated with great accuracy for the Russian market.
PIC has implemented GNX (Genetic Nucleus Crossbred) data capture within the Duroc population so we understand and measure how the offspring of boars perform in commercial environments similar to customer systems. Before being used for the production of the next generation of pure line animals, the semen of the elite Duroc boars is first sent to specific commercial farms and then only used for the production of pure line animals on nucleus farms. Around 200 finisher pigs are produced for each elite boar. The data captured during the growth of those offspring till their slaughter in a commercial environment is of great value to later select the pure line animals whom they are related to on a number of traits such as robustness and integrated value with an increased accuracy.
On Otrada's nucleus farm the off-test of the animals is performed at 20 weeks. For each candidate boar we record individual growth and feed intake data in pig performance testing stations from Schauer, this allows to identify the most efficient boars at heavy weight, which answers to a strong trend in the hog market in Russia.
We will not only make sure that the animals are lean but extra muscular with the use of the Live Muscle Scan. With the same Scanner we will assess the Intramuscular Fat percentage. This is an important meat quality trait as a more marbled meat is usually associated with a more flavored meat and improved texture. Parameter pH 24h is part of the data captured in the breeding program as it is meaningful for both the fresh pork eating quality and for further processing quality. Meat tenderness is also one of the traits recorded in the program as it correlates closely to the consumer experience of chewing cooked meat, and the satisfaction related.
With the leg scoring we ensure that the animals have increased structural soundness, which will ensure that their period of use improves at the boar studs of our clients.
Вy introducing data collection on the reasons of death of the pigs during their whole rearing period, the robustness of the animals will be increased. This work has started for several years at Mollevang farm, the Elite farm that we are connected with. Specific attention on the reduction of hernias is an important part of this work to increase the robustness of our Otrada Duroc population.
The genomic selection will bring several improvements: by refining the relationship degree between each considered animal and its relatives we can early identify the superior animals and assess with a greater accuracy the genetic value for each animal produced. For each pure line boar a tissue sample is sent to the Neogen lab located in Scotland.
The combination of the different improvements introduced at Otrada's nucleus allows us to propose animals with high genetic value. The precision and accuracy of the indexes are a consequence of the extent and the quality of the data collection involved in the genetic program (both at pure line and crossbred level).
A recent commercial trial conducted in the USA confirmed the interest of the performances of the Duroc line in terms of daily gain and livability (see the table).
In this trial the finishing performances of 500 commercial pigs per each sire line were measured for a period of 12 weeks with a starting point of 34 kg on average. The two competitor boars were one Duroc boar available in North America (Boar A), and a globally available white composite boar - including Russia - (Boar B).
The finisher pigs sired by Duroc showed a superior daily gain, improved feed conversion and improved percentage of full value pigs, compared to the offspring of other competitors' lines.
PIC has implemented GNX (Genetic Nucleus Crossbred) data capture within the Duroc population so we understand and measure how the offspring of boars perform in commercial environments similar to customer systems. Before being used for the production of the next generation of pure line animals, the semen of the elite Duroc boars is first sent to specific commercial farms and then only used for the production of pure line animals on nucleus farms. Around 200 finisher pigs are produced for each elite boar. The data captured during the growth of those offspring till their slaughter in a commercial environment is of great value to later select the pure line animals whom they are related to on a number of traits such as robustness and integrated value with an increased accuracy.
On Otrada's nucleus farm the off-test of the animals is performed at 20 weeks. For each candidate boar we record individual growth and feed intake data in pig performance testing stations from Schauer, this allows to identify the most efficient boars at heavy weight, which answers to a strong trend in the hog market in Russia.
We will not only make sure that the animals are lean but extra muscular with the use of the Live Muscle Scan. With the same Scanner we will assess the Intramuscular Fat percentage. This is an important meat quality trait as a more marbled meat is usually associated with a more flavored meat and improved texture. Parameter pH 24h is part of the data captured in the breeding program as it is meaningful for both the fresh pork eating quality and for further processing quality. Meat tenderness is also one of the traits recorded in the program as it correlates closely to the consumer experience of chewing cooked meat, and the satisfaction related.
With the leg scoring we ensure that the animals have increased structural soundness, which will ensure that their period of use improves at the boar studs of our clients.
Вy introducing data collection on the reasons of death of the pigs during their whole rearing period, the robustness of the animals will be increased. This work has started for several years at Mollevang farm, the Elite farm that we are connected with. Specific attention on the reduction of hernias is an important part of this work to increase the robustness of our Otrada Duroc population.
The genomic selection will bring several improvements: by refining the relationship degree between each considered animal and its relatives we can early identify the superior animals and assess with a greater accuracy the genetic value for each animal produced. For each pure line boar a tissue sample is sent to the Neogen lab located in Scotland.
The combination of the different improvements introduced at Otrada's nucleus allows us to propose animals with high genetic value. The precision and accuracy of the indexes are a consequence of the extent and the quality of the data collection involved in the genetic program (both at pure line and crossbred level).
A recent commercial trial conducted in the USA confirmed the interest of the performances of the Duroc line in terms of daily gain and livability (see the table).
In this trial the finishing performances of 500 commercial pigs per each sire line were measured for a period of 12 weeks with a starting point of 34 kg on average. The two competitor boars were one Duroc boar available in North America (Boar A), and a globally available white composite boar - including Russia - (Boar B).
The finisher pigs sired by Duroc showed a superior daily gain, improved feed conversion and improved percentage of full value pigs, compared to the offspring of other competitors' lines.
Source: PIC – Technical bulletin July 2020
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By proposing a fast growing efficient boar up to heavy weight with increased robustness, we believe that we are presenting to the market a product that perfectly fits the requirement of the Russian modern pig producers.
Animals & Crops Director
Kim Christensen
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