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Enhancing Piglet Health, Welfare, and Pre‑Weaning Survival in Hyperprolific Sow...
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Enhancing Piglet Health, Welfare, and Pre‑Weaning Survival in Hyperprolific Sow Systems

A Special Issue of Agriculture (ISSN 2077-0472) belonging to the section "Farm Animal Production".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 25 January 2027 | Viewed by 607

Editors

Prof. Dr. Vasileios Papatsiros

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Clinic of Medicine, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Thessaly, 43100 Karditsa, Greece
Interests: porcine medicine; porcine herd health management; porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV); porcine circovirus-associated diseases (PCVAD); porcine respiratory disease complex (PRDC); reproductive diseases in sows and boars; welfare and production; heat stress; alternatives to antibiotics; vaccines; feed additives; mycotoxins; zoonoses
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Nikolaos Tsekouras

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor Assistant
Clinic of Medicine, Faculty of Veterinary Science, University of Thessaly, 43100 Karditsa, Greece
Interests: swine medicine; animal welfare; antimicrobial resistance; preventive veterinary medicine; mycotoxins

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The rapid adoption of hyperprolific sow genetics has reshaped modern pig production, creating new possibilities but also intensifying challenges for neonatal health, welfare, and survival. Larger litters increase variability in birth weight, intensify competition for colostrum, and heighten vulnerability to early-life disorders. At the same time, the welfare of both sows and piglets has become a central pillar of sustainable production systems.

This Special Issue invites contributions that deepen our understanding of the biological, environmental, nutritional, and managerial factors influencing piglet robustness in high-prolificacy herds. We aim to highlight innovative approaches that support healthier early-life development while maintaining productivity and welfare standards.

We welcome submissions on neonatal disease control, colostrum management, welfare-oriented farrowing systems, environmental optimization, maternal behavior, antimicrobial resistance, precision technologies, and preventive veterinary medicine. Studies addressing neonatal diarrhea, piglet vitality, sow–piglet interactions, nutritional strategies, pathogen control, and One Health perspectives are particularly encouraged.

Topics of interest for publication include, but are not limited to, the following: Piglet health and welfare, Pre‑weaning survival, Hyperprolific sow management, Neonatal diarrhea, Colostrum management, Environmental and nutritional optimization, Maternal behavior, Antimicrobial resistance, Preventive veterinary medicine, One Health approaches

Prof. Dr. Vasileios Papatsiros
Guest Editor

Dr. Nikolaos Tsekouras
Guest Editor Assistant

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Agriculture is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • piglet survival
  • hyperprolific sows
  • piglet welfare
  • pre-weaning survival
  • neonatal diarrhea
  • colostrum management

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Review

29 pages, 7747 KB  
Review
Hyperprolificacy in Modern Sow Genetics: A Review of the Neonatal, Immunological, and Welfare Costs of Increased Litter Size
by Vasileios G. Papatsiros, Georgios I. Papakonstantinou and Nikolaos Tsekouras
Agriculture 2026, 16(17), 1877; https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture16171877 - 29 Aug 2026
Viewed by 420
Abstract
Over the past two decades, genetic selection has increased average total litter size in commercial sow herds from approximately 9–10 piglets to more than 14 piglets per farrowing, an achievement that has delivered clear economic benefit but has been accompanied by a parallel [...] Read more.
Over the past two decades, genetic selection has increased average total litter size in commercial sow herds from approximately 9–10 piglets to more than 14 piglets per farrowing, an achievement that has delivered clear economic benefit but has been accompanied by a parallel rise in pre-weaning mortality (PWM), which is now commonly reported in the range of 12–20% and, by some indicative estimates, is trending upward even in well-managed herds. This review synthesizes the veterinary and reproductive-physiology literature on hyperprolificacy in sows, examining its downstream consequences for individual piglet birth weight, farrowing duration, colostrum access, and passive immunoglobulin G (IgG) transfer. Attention is given to the biological mechanism by which litter size dilutes colostral IgG, including vaccine-induced maternally derived antibody (MDA) against porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV) and porcine circovirus type 2 (PCV2), and to the strength of the supporting evidence with regard to each pathogen, which differs considerably. This evidence is considerably stronger for PCV2, where maternal vaccination has a directly demonstrated effect on offspring antibody titres, than for PRRSV, where litter-size-specific dilution of maternally derived antibody has not yet been directly measured and remains an inferred, biologically plausible mechanism rather than a demonstrated one. The review further appraises management interventions including cross-fostering, split suckling, nurse sows, immunoglobulin supplementation, and structured neonatal triage, together with their documented trade-offs and considers the animal-welfare dimension of continued genetic selection for litter size. A dedicated section evaluates the current state of precision livestock farming (automated farrowing and crushing surveillance, computer-vision piglet weighing, and genomic selection for litter uniformity and robustness), concluding that these tools are promising but largely still at the research or early-adoption stage. We conclude that inadequate transfer of passive immunity behaves as an independent risk factor for mortality, separate from birth weight, and that management responses should be viewed as necessary complements to, rather than substitutes for, a re-balancing of genetic selection indices toward piglet survivability. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Enhancing Piglet Health, Welfare, and Pre‑Weaning Survival in Hyperprolific Sow Systems)
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