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Goal
Identify quickly the different batches of sows.
Trick
Each batch is identified with a different colour, so when we have to carry out any kind of handling we will only have to look at the colour of the pegs.
Explanation
It is always very useful to be able to identify efficiently the sows in our farm that belong to a same production batch. If we label them with a mark of a same colour, their identification is very quick, and we avoid having to look at the numbers of the sows or their insemination dates.
Probably, the most useful thing to use are clothes pegs with different colours to be assigned to each of the batches and hold the pegs to the sows index cards.
This trick is useful on the farms that work with a batch management > 1 week, because the number of batches (colours) is relatively low.
| Kind of batch management | No. of batches / colours present |
| Every 5 weeks | 4 |
| Every 4 weeks | 5 |
| Every 3 weeks | 7 |
| Every 2 weeks | 10 |
| Weekly | 20 (with weaning at 21 days) |
In the case of weekly batches we would need 20 different colours, and this is not easy to manage.
Identification of the colour in the production planning chart
Adapted by Carles Casanovas Granell, swine veterinary consultant (Spain). The basis of this idea has already been published in a summary of tricks written by PORC Magazine several years ago, and this trick was assigned to Daniel Gallet - La Gravelle 35 Vitré (France).
