Jack Owen Summer 2023 WinMor Farms Internship
Self Bio
Hello I am Jack Owen and I have been born and raised in Willcox, Arizona. I grew up on my families farm and have been able to learn many skills about growing crops and raising livestock. When I was a freshman in high school I decided to start my own show pig breeding business and have really enjoyed the connections and friends I have made. I currently have 7 sows and hope to have a large operation once I finish college. The Internship I am doing is helping me expand my knowledge about the swine industry and help me see if I really want to do this for the rest of my life.
Goals
- Learn how to stay on track and consistent with your farm when you have 80 plus sows to manage.
- Learn what you should look for when breeding boars to sows to create pigs that can go on and win shows.
- Learning different type of feed rations and how to know what percentage feed you should feed to the different body styles of pigs.
Week 1
I arrived at WinMor Farms in Grinnell Iowa on June 23rd, however I left Arizona on the 21st and made a stop in Kansas on my way here. When I first got here they showed me their facilities and talked to me about their biosecurity proto calls to ensure their farm stays disease free. In my first week of being here between three people we walked 22 pigs every morning, conditioned their skin, and cleaned pens. In the first few days I was here there were 14 sows in the farrowing crates that we farrowed out and made sure all of the births went smoothly. Once the piglets were born we went through and gave them their first set of vaccines as well as ear-notch in the first 24 hours. After they were three days old we docked tails and gave them their dosage of iron since baby pigs have an iron deficiency when they are born. So far I am loving Iowa and have got to experience a lot of things they do differently compared to my operation.
Week 2
As I started my second week here we continued to work all their show pigs as county fair was only two weeks away. Watching the nutrition and growth is vital for the care of show pigs to ensure that the animal is looking the best they possibly can by the time they get to their main show. I was learning about the different proteins and when to feed them to the different body types of pigs. We were also watching the growth of the baby pigs to make sure they were all getting the right nutrition from their mom. Another thing that WinMor Farms focus's a lot on is breeding to good boars, the main owner Ron and I went to Indiana as well as Illinois and looked at 90 plus boars between two different studs, and I was able to learn a lot about what you want to look for and what traits you want in both the Boar and the Sow to ensure really good breeding matches. Seeing the facilities of theses boar studs and all the investments they had was a very cool experience.
Week 3
This week we continued to work pigs and make sure they were looking the best they possible could as the county fair was coming around quickly. I helped with clipping pigs and ensuring their hair blended together smoothly. The babies were getting bigger and closer to weaning age so we started them on milk because if they weren't getting as much from their mom that they needed they would still be able to thrive. It was my job to go through and clean the pans and then make fresh milk every morning. Before the weaning day we added the starter feed to the milk to get them use to the feed for an easy transition.
Week 4
Week 4 is county fair week, between both of their girls we took 12 pigs to their fair and we able to win grand overall breeding gilt and reserve overall market hog. During the fair we were constantly getting pigs out and walking them as well as watering them every hour. Making sure all of their pigs were looking the best they could was very important. As county fair wrapped up we went back to the farm and continued the daily chores. On this weeks agenda we had to grind feed and wean the babies, when we grinded feed we put the proper ration of corn and soy bean mill in the grinder as well as all the minerals and proteins to make sow feed that will last about a month. In this process we made about 12 tons of sow feed in about 4 hours. Before we weaned the sows we went through and gave all the babies there 3 week vaccine and gave the sows farrowsure gold which helps them for their next breeding cycle in a couple weeks. Moving the sows back into the sow house was a very easy process because once they have been with their babies for 21 days they start getting angry and exhausted. Now the babies are on a starter feed and will get moved to shavings soon.
Week 5
This being my last week here, I finished my awesome internship off with a bunch of different tasks. Before we moved the babies to the chip barn we had to power wash all of the pens and the concrete to make sure it was clean for the new pigs. Once all the pigs got moved out of the farrowing house we went through and power washed the side of the farrowing house that the pigs were on, to make sure those crates were ready for the next group of sows to farrow. As we continued our normal chores of cleaning pens and feeding pigs, we started breeding a group of 30 sows that are set to farrow December 1st. This was a very interesting process because we first took all the semen to the Iowa State lab and tested its quality and once we knew it was good quality we started breeding sows. Watching and helping them breed sows was awesome because they used different techniques then what we were taught, and I hope to bring some of the ways they do things into my heard.
Take-aways
1) I was able to learn about the breeding and selection process of pairing up boars to sows to ensure the best offspring.
2) I learned about the day-to-day work that has to be done to keep the operation running smoothly, such as cleaning pens and feeding pigs.
3) Getting to see how the state of Iowa is and how their state and county shows are run, were really cool to see. The involvement of the state in the livestock and pig industry was very neat to see.