Novel Resilience Phenotypes from a Natural Disease Challenge Model for Wean-to-Finish Pigs

Novel phenotypes from a commercial testing system could add value to selection for resilience to disease and other stressors beyond simply collecting mortality. Day-to-day variability in feed intake (FI) and in duration at the feeder (DUR), quantified by root mean squared errors (RMSE), were investigated as novel measures of resilience using data from grow-finish pigs in a natural disease challenge facility. • RMSE of FI and DUR were moderately heritable • RMSE of FI and DUR showed moderate to strong genetic correlations with mortality and treatments These results show that day-to-day variation in FI and DUR in a challenge environment can be used as indicator traits to select for disease resilience