The Horrifying Autosow

My friend Bob McKay sent me this 1967 picture from the archives at North Carolina State University (here) of Dr. James Lecce with a piglet and the "autosow," an effort to make piglets grow faster by replacing their natural mother. Horrifying, if not surprising. Given the contemporary debate over gestation crates, I'm somewhat surprised that this type of technological solution hasn't been put back on the table as it apparently was in the late 1960s. Must look into this further...