Providing adequate creep areas for newborn piglets that give warmth and protection from crushing is a critical welfare intervention in the first days of life.
Neonatal piglet welfare in the first 72 hours of life depends critically on colostrum access, warmth, and protection from crushing. Piglets that cannot access adequate creep heating develop hypothermia that reduces colostrum intake and immunity. Good creep design that attracts piglets away from the sow at rest times prevents crushing deaths and associated welfare harms of injury and lingering death. This is one area where housing design directly prevents acute welfare events.