A long version description of PED and how it affects production and a timing explanation is:

We had one of our units go PED positive the of Thanksgiving. The next to 0 live pigs weaned hits 4-5 weeks after the initial break. Christmas week we weaned 0 pigs out of that unit and 15-20% of normal New Years week. It takes 4-5 weeks to get back to normal. 12 weeks after the infection date (Thanksgiving week), the herd relapsed and we weaned 80% of normal for about 8 more weeks. This is pretty normal for the wicked PED strain. There is 2 PED strains and a Corona Virus breaking in the US. The other PED strain is not as bad. I have heard horror stories of farms not getting above 60% for a long period of time.

Interpreting the positive PED cases reported gets more complicated after Jan. Reason is farms like ours were testing to find out when we went PED negative. So it is impossible to tell from the new positives from farms re testing.

Our initial PED marketing hole is in marketings from June 1 - July 25. Our secondary hole is from August 1 - October 1. I believe the biggest PED hole for the country is coming in August and first part of September when there is more of the initial breaks on top of our secondary dip.

Our packer that we delivery to is not killing tomorrow or Monday and can be seen in the 201 report swine scheduled for tomorrow is low and probably 200-220k kill tomorrow.

Crazy markets that is for sure. Looks to me we have hit a demand hole with end users believing they can buy cheaper pork in a month. Volatility is driving me crazy and will be here with spurts and dips in demand.