Guanidinoacetic acid as a feed supplement offered to weaned piglets

ABSTRACT

Guanidinoacetic acid (GAA) is a natural precursor for creatine, which is involved in physiological energy generation. Six hundred and ninety-nine weaned pigs (6-30 kg) were fed a basal diet (Diet 1-4, corresponding to four phases) without (CTRL) and with 0.12% GAA supplementation. Pigs in the CTRL group displayed higher (P < 0.05) average daily gain and lower feed conversion ratio, and body weight, during the periods of Diet 1 and 2, compared with GAA pigs. In the period of Diet 3 CTRL pigs tended (P < 0.10) to be heavier than GAA pigs, whereas in the period of Diet 4 GAA pigs tended (P < 0.10) to grow faster than CTRL pigs. Over the entire experimental period CTRL compared with GAA pigs displayed improved feed efficiency (P < 0.05) and tended (P < 0.10) to grow faster. In conclusion, GAA did show minor potential to increase average daily gain in the last part of the weaning phase.

KEYWORDS:

• Weaner pigs
• growth
• feed additive
• guanidinoacetic acid

Acknowledgment

We thank pig producer Aage Lauritzen and his staff for help with weighing the pigs and general data collection.

Disclosure statement

Jacob Dall is employed by the premix company (Vilofoss) who provided the data. The authors declare no other conflicts of interest. The authors jointly analysed and interpreted the data and wrote the manuscript.