Digestibility, rate of passage and rate of gain in the gastrectomized pig

Some effects of including differently processed barley in the diet of the growing pig: 1. Growth rate, food conversion efficiency, digestibility and rate of passage through the gut

1. An experiment was conducted in which the effects on growth rate, food conversion efficiency, digestibility and rate of passage through the gut of diets containing 85% of differently processed barley, fed to growing pigs, were studied. Five different processing treatments were compared with the inclusion of the grain in the whole (unground) form (diet W). The processing treatments were: grinding through (1·56 mm), (4·68 mm) and (9·36 mm) screens (diets O, T and S respectively); cold rolling (diet R) and coarse crimping (diet C).

2. Differences in growth rate and food conversion efficiency between diets O, T, S and R were small and not significant with a slight overall superiority evidenced for diet R over the other three. Compared with these results those of diets C and W were inferior, significantly so for both diets in growth rate but for diet W only in food conversion efficiency. Diet C was superior to diet W in both of these parameters (significantly so for growth rate).

3. The overall digestibility of diet W was significantly poorer and the rate of passage through the gut faster than for any of the other diets. Diet O was retained in the gut significantly longer than any of the other diets and gave the highest coefficient of apparent digestibility for both the ether extract and crude fibre fractions of the diet.