USDA’s quarterly hogs and pigs report out Friday revealed the lowest inventory of U.S. swine since 2007, at 62.1 million head – about five percent below last year.

Also down five percent from a year ago were the market hog inventory at 56.3 million head, the March-May 2014 pig crop, at 27.4 million head, and the number of pigs per litter at 9.78 compared to 10.31 last year. Those last two numbers are the indicators of how Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea virus (PEDv) continues to impact the industry.

“My anticipation was that as we got into some warmer weather we’d see death losses from PED moderate somewhat,” said Dr. Chris Hurt, who added that it did come down a little bit, but not as much as he expected.

Hurt noted that pigs per litter had been on an upward trend for about five years, but that ended last October when it was down two percent. “By December we were up to six percent, Jan-Feb-March, up around eight percent,” said Hurt. “The warm weather months may have reduced death loss but we certainly aren’t under control yet.”

Breeding inventory, at 5.85 million head, and producers intentions to have 2.89 million sows farrow during the summer quarter are both basically the same as a year ago, which Hurt says indicates no immediate plans for expansion, despite higher margins. “As we look at the profitability that has been there for 7-8 months now, I thought we would probably begin to see some expansion showing up,” he said. “But no, that is not the case.” Farrowing intentions for the fall, however, are up four percent compared to last year.

Listen to Hurt’s comments from the National Pork Board review of the quarterly report: Dr. Chris Hurt, USDA Hogs and Pigs report comments