Effect of floor space during transport of market-weight pigs on the incidence of transport losses at the packing plant and the relationships between transport conditions and losses

Data on 74 trailer loads of finishing pigs (mean BW = 129.0, SEM = 0.63 kg) from wean-to-finish buildings on 2 farms within 1 production system were collected to investigate the effect of amount of floor space on the trailer (0.39 or 0.48 m 2 /pig) during trans- port on the incidence of losses (dead and nonambulatory pigs) at the packing plant and to study the relationships between transport conditions and losses. Pigs were loaded using standard commercial procedures for pig handling and transportation. Two designs of flat-deck trailers with 2 decks were used. Floor space treatments were compared in 2 similarly sized compartments on each deck of each trailer type. Differences in floor space were created by varying the number of pigs in each compartment. The incidence of nonambulatory pigs at the farm during loading and at the plant after un- loading, average load weight, load number within each day, event times, and temperature and relative humid- ity in the trailer from loading to unloading were re- corded. Of the 12,511 pigs transported, 0.26% were non- ambulatory at the farm, 0.23% were dead on arrival, and 0.85% were nonambulatory at the plant. Increasing