Apparent ileal digestibility of amino acids in wet wheat protein and soya bean meal for growing pigs

Authors

• Markku Mäkinen Agricultural Research Centre of Finland, Institute of Animal Production, FIN-31600 Jokioinen, Finland
• Hilkka Siljander-Rasi Agricultural Research Centre of Finland, Swine Research Station, Tervamäentie 179, FIN-05840 Hyvinkää, Finland

DOI: https://doi.org/10.23986/afsci.72768

Abstract

A study was conducted on four castrated male pigs to determine the apparent ileal digestibility (AID) of crude protein (CP) and amino acids in wheat protein (WP), a wet by-product of the starch and gluten industry, and in soya bean meal (SBM). The pigs were fitted with a steered ileo-caecal valve cannula at a liveweight of 35 kg. They were assigned to two semi-purified wheat starch based diets, with either WP or SBM as a sole protein source, and fed according to a three-period reversal design. The diets were formulated to contain 140 g CP/kg DM, 11.3 MJ net energy/kg DM and similar amounts of lysine, methionine and threonine. The CP content and the lysine and threonine contents in CP were lower in WP than in SBM. Nearly half of the DM in WP was starch, and the crude fibre content of the product was very low. The apparent ileal and total tract digestibilities of CP were very similar in both the WP and SBM diets. The AID of methionine was higher in WP (88.2%) than in SBM (84.6%) diets (P<0.01) but no differences were found in the AID of the other amino acids. The results show that the AID values of CP and amino acids in WP in growing pigs are comparable to those in SBM.