Why don't we just let the animals impregnate themselves? Why are we getting involved? Can't the farmers just put the two desired animals in an area by themselves and let nature take its course?

Forgive me for being ignorant on the subject. Is there some sort of inherent danger with letting the animals "do there thing?"

Pls forgive the misspelling of "their."

First of all, some good questions.

The reason that pigs are inseminated is because of two things: safety of the workers, and safety of the animals. It is because of that that the sows are inseminated artificially. If the boar was let in with the sow, there is risk of fighting being involved, the boar getting hurt during the mating process, boars and/or sows getting nasty when they have to be separated, all sorts of things. Another thing is that the boars that are there are sometimes not the sires that producers want to breed their sows; straws from other boars that are a distance away can be bought and stored to be used in desired sows at less costs. This goes for all livestock.

With turkeys, AI is not an option, it's a must. The way the turkeys have been selected means that they're breast mass is so large that it is impossible for them to bred other turkey hens naturally. So human intervention is necessary to produce offspring.

With dairy cattle, AI is a must because of the immense dangers of keeping dairy bulls. Dairy bulls are the nastiest creatures man has created, and are a pain to keep and handle. For the reasons expressed above about purchasing straws from distant different sires, AI makes it easier (though not without its labour costs in heat detection methods) to produce offspring.

With beef cattle, goats, sheep, horses and chickens, AI is more of an option than a must. AI is more rare in chickens than it is in beef cows, goats and sheep, and AI is used more often in some horse breeding than in beef cattle, goats and sheep. Roosters are most always put with the hens in the broiler and layer industry, as are rams and bucks are put in with the ewes and does. Mares can get ansy when put to breed with a stallion, so either they have to be restrained in order for the stallion to mate with her to minimize injury to him, or she has to be AI'd. With beef cows, it's a choice between time and costs of whether to simply throw a bull in with the herd, or use heat detection methods used in dairy cows to run them through the chute to have them AI'd. Some folks use AI because they hate to have to handle bulls. Others use bulls because the conception rate is higher and the labour that goes into having their cows bred is lower.

I hope that answers your question.