Influence of dietary amino acid level on chemical body composition and performance of growing-finishing boars of two sire lines

Abstract

There is only little information available concerning the chemical body composition of growing-finishing boars. For that reason, a total of 26 entire male pigs (boars) of two different Piétrain sire lines were fed with different levels of dietary essential amino acids (EAA) and the influence of this treatment on performance and chemical body composition was evaluated.

In addition, an initial group of eight boars (n = 4 per sire line) was slaughtered at approximately 21 kg live weight (LW). The other 26 boars were fed three different diets containing 11.5, 13.2 and 14.9 g lysine/kg during the grower period and 9.0, 10.4, 11.7 g lysine/kg during the finisher period, respectively. Other EAA were added in relation to lysine (Lys: Met + Cys: Thr: Trp: Val = 1: 0.60: 0.65: 0.18: 0.75). At a LW of approximately 122 kg these 26 boars (six groups with three to seven animals each) were also slaughtered. The effects of EAA level and sire line on fattening and slaughter performance was recorded, and body and weight gain composition were analysed. There were no significant effects of EAA level on performance or on chemical body composition. Boars sired with Piétrain line 1 demonstrated increased lean meat content and protein body content (p < 0.05) as compared to Piétrain line 2-sired boars.

Keywords:

• amino acids
• boar feeding
• body composition
• genotypes
• performance

Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge the partners of the joint research project “Feeding of boars” (Friedrich-Loeffler-Institute (FLI), Federal Research Institute for Animal Health, Braunschweig; State Office for Rural Development, Agriculture and Land Reallocation Brandenburg, Teltow/Ruhlsdorf; State Institute for Agriculture, Forestry and Horticulture Saxony-Anhalt, Centre for Livestock Husbandry and Equipment, Iden; Thuringian State Institute for Agriculture, Regional Office Bad Salzungen; University of Rostock, Faculty of Agriculture and Environmental Science, Chair for Nutrition Physiology and Animal Nutrition, Rostock; Hauptgenossenschaft Nord AG, Kiel; Deutsche Vilomix Tierernährung GmbH, Neuenkirchen-Vörden; Institute of Agriculture and Fishery Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Institute for Animal Production, Dummerstorf; Evonik Industries AG, Hanau-Wolfgang; Deutsche Tiernahrung Cremer GmbH & Co. KG, Düsseldorf; Martin-Luther-University Halle-Wittenberg, Faculty of Natural Science III, Institute of Agriculture and Nutritional Science, Chair for Animal Nutrition, Halle (Saale). In addition, the authors would like to thank the co-workers of the Institute of Animal Nutrition of the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institute (FLI) in Braunschweig and the co-workers of the performance test centre in Iden for assistance in performing the experiment and the analysis.

Funding

This study was part of the joint research project “Feeding of boars” and was financially supported by the innovation program of the Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection (Support Code 2813802610).