Post by Orlaith on Jun 9, 2011 14:41:47 GMT
I found this article at work. I'll link to it, but you might need a license to read it: linkie
Everyone says that back-to-back pregnancies are bad for sows as it's too much of a strain on them, but the gist of this article is that it's also bad for the pups. What the study showed is that sows who were nursing but already pregnant with their next litter ignored sounds of pups, but sows who were nursing and not pregnant responded really strongly to pup noises.
So this means that if you breed your sow back-to-back, she will not nurse her first litter properly and they won't be as healthy because she will ignore them and focus on getting ready for the next litter.
Thought it was interesting!
Naquib said:
Offspring signalling can serve to communicate need to the parents and thus influence parental readiness to provide care. Offspring stimuli that affect parental care have been investigated extensively. Yet much less is known about the mechanisms leading to a decline in maternal motivation when conflicts of provisioning current and future offspring may arise. Here we tested responses by pregnant and non-pregnant female guinea pigs (Cavia aperea f. porcellus) to playback of pup calls during their period of lactation for dependent offspring. Most concurrently pregnant and lactating females did not respond to pup calls, whereas non-pregnant lactating females responded strongly. Our findings expand on previous studies by showing that female behavioural responsiveness to pup stimuli is strongly reduced by concurrent pregnancy and lactation. These instantaneous measurements of female responsiveness to young show more directly than standard measures like nursing performance or time to weaning how female motivation to care for current offspring is diminished by simultaneous gestation.Everyone says that back-to-back pregnancies are bad for sows as it's too much of a strain on them, but the gist of this article is that it's also bad for the pups. What the study showed is that sows who were nursing but already pregnant with their next litter ignored sounds of pups, but sows who were nursing and not pregnant responded really strongly to pup noises.
So this means that if you breed your sow back-to-back, she will not nurse her first litter properly and they won't be as healthy because she will ignore them and focus on getting ready for the next litter.
Thought it was interesting!
