Clinical and genetic studies of disturbed milk production in sows

Disturbed milk production was studied in Swedish Yorkshire sows. In a clini cal study of 13 sows, milk production ceased rapidly 23 days after farrowin g without any general signs of infection. Prolactin levels were low in thes e sows when milk production ceased. An intensive study of two sows indicate d that the disturbance is not caused by low prolactin levels around farrowi ng. A genetic analysis based on the litter recording scheme was performed o n 10 684 sows, of which 3.3% were reported as having disturbed milk product ion. The heritability of disturbed milk production was estimated to be 0.7 with a threshold model, using Gibbs sampling.