As it enters its 10th year of operation, we would like to highlight the building that set the group sow housing industry standard, the Eagle Creek Colony electronic sow feeding facility. The Eagle Creek barn is a 1,000 sow farrow to finish site located near Altamont, MB. It was designed using large-pen gestation and Nedap equipment and the year-to-year annual weaning in the facility is nearly 32 pigs/sow/year, which is above most conventional systems. It is a fully dynamic building with central separation. New Standard started designing the building in January 2007, and later began construction in April. The first animals were introduced to the barn in April 2008. The finisher barn was later completed in 2010.

How you design for and manage your Electronic Sow Feeding systems in your barn is key to a high functioning sow unit. When a feed station is incorporated poorly into a pen, it is certain to cause a myriad of problems, increasing sow stress and reducing your production. When designing feed stations into a barn, we take the time to understand your managerial approach along with your employees' and animals' needs to make your barn highly effective and negate sow stress and digestive issues. As important as the ESF configuration and design is, how you manage your barn is even more crucial. Here is some insight on how we suggest you manage feed cycles once your group housing facility is up and running.

Electronic Sow Feeding (ESF) is a shift in how we manage sows in group housing and the North American market is rapidly moving towards housing sows in large open pens. Group sow housing with electronic sow feeding is designed to create stress free and efficient husbandry. With ESF systems you will save on feed, improve animal welfare, and increase hog production. Switching your barn to ESF systems or building these systems into your new barn can help you manage your hog facilities more easily.