Desempeño productivo de cerdas yorkshire puras y cruzadas en una granja comercial de Venezuela.

A study was conducted to evaluate the productive performance of pure and crossbred Yorkshire sows in a commercial farm in Venezuela. The effect of maternal line (80 Yorkshire sows and 80 ½ Landrace × ½ Yorkshire sows) and parity number (first, second, third, fourth or more) on feed intake of sows (FI), backfat thickness at farrowing (BF1) and at the end of lactation (BF2), backfat loss during lactation (BFL), body weight at 110 days of gestation (BW110G) and at the end of lactation (BW21L), number of piglets born alive (NPBA), dead (NPBD), mummies (NPBM), litter birth-weight (LBW) and at weaning (LWW), number of weaned piglets (NWP), and weaning to estrous interval (WEI) were evaluated. The FI and WEI were not different (P>0.05) between maternal lines or among parities. Both factors affected (P<0.05) BFL of sows, with greater values (P<0.01) in crossbred sows (2.77 mm) with respect to pure sows (1.52 mm). First and second-parity sows had greater BFL (P<0.01) than the other groups. The BW21L was greater (P<0.01) in crossbred sows compared to pure sows (206.39 vs. 197.47 kg), and was the lowest (P<0.01) in first parity sows. The LBW was lower (P<0.05) in first parity sows than that of sows of three or more parities. The crossbred sows had greater NPBA (P<0.05) and NWP (P<0.01) than pure sows (12.86 vs. 11.67 and 10.84 vs. 9.78, respec-tively). The interaction between maternal line and parity number affected LWW, which was greatest (P<0.05) in crossbred sows in the three first parities. Crossbred sows showed the best productive performance which implies that they could be and exposes it as the best alternative for selection of breeding sows in the evaluated farm.