McGhee, M. L., and H. H. Stein. 2021. Hybrid Rye May Replace Corn in Diets for Nursery Pigs Without Negatively Affecting Average Daily Gain, but gain:feed May Be Reduced. J. Anim. Sci. 99(Suppl. 1): 51–52. doi.org/10.1093/jas/skab054.087. Link to Abstract.

Hybrid rye may replace a portion of barley or wheat in diets for growing and finishing pigs with minimal impact on growth performance or carcass characteristics, but at very high inclusion rates in finishing diets, feed intake may be reduced if hybrid rye replaces wheat. However, limited published data exist for effects of feeding hybrid rye to growing-finishing pigs in place of corn. Therefore, an experiment was conducted to test the hypothesis that average daily gain (ADG) and carcass characteristics will not differ when hybrid rye partially replaces corn in diets for growing-finishing pigs.

Lagos, L. Vanessa, Su A Lee, Mike R. Bedford, and Hans H. Stein. 2021. Formulating diets based on digestible calcium instead of total calcium does not affect growth performance or carcass characteristics, but microbial phytase ameliorates bone resorption caused by low calcium in diets fed to pigs from 11 to 130 kg. Journal of Animal Science, 2021, Vol. 99, No. 3, 1–11. doi:10.1093/jas/skab057.

Ansia, I., H. H. Stein, C. Brøkner, C. A. Hayes, and J. K. Drackley. 2021. Nutrient digestibility and endogenous protein losses in the foregut and small intestine of weaned dairy calves fed calf starters with conventional or enzyme-treated soybean meal. J. Dairy Sci. 104:2979–2995. doi.org/10.3168/jds.2020-18776.

Conventional breeding of corn has generated a new variety (i.e., high-oil corn; Byron Seeds LLC, Rockville, IN), which is believed to contain more oil and phosphorus than conventional corn. Because of the increased oil, it is possible that high-oil corn contains more digestible energy (DE) and metabolizable energy (ME) than conventional hybrids, but this hypothesis has not been experimentally verified. Inclusion of microbial phytase in diets for pigs usually improves digestibility of P because phytase hydrolyzes the ester bond that binds P to the phytate molecule in corn. However, there are at this point no data for effects of adding phytase to diets containing high-oil corn and no data to demonstrate the nutritional value of high-oil corn. Therefore, an experiment was conducted to test the hypothesis that the standardized total tract digestibility (STTD) of P, as well as concentrations of DE and ME in high-oil corn are greater than in conventional corn. The second hypothesis was that inclusion of microbial phytase to diets improves the STTD of P in corn sources.

To obtain accurate values for metabolizable energy (ME) in diets and ingredients, an accurate estimation of gross energy (GE) in urine is required. Urine samples are often prepared following the freeze-dried cotton-plastic bag method and GE is determined by the ignition of the sample in a bomb calorimeter. However, the concentration of GE in urine can also be determined by dripping urine on a cellulose pellet, which can then be ignited in a bomb calorimeter. Alternatively, energy in urine can be calculated from the concentration of N in urine assuming that all energy in urine originates from N. The latter 2 methods may be less expensive and less time consuming than using the freeze-dried cotton-plastic bag method. Likewise, oven drying instead of freeze drying of samples may reduce time and cost of the drying procedure. However, to our knowledge, no data comparing values for GE in urine and ME in diets among different sample preparation and drying methods are available. Therefore, the objective of this study was to test the hypothesis that there are no differences in GE of urine or ME values of diets among sample preparation methods (freeze-dried cotton-plastic bag, undried cellulose pellet, or N value method). The second hypothesis was that drying method (freeze drying or oven drying) of cotton-plastic bag urine samples from pigs do not influence analyzed the GE in urine or calculated ME in diets.

Espinosa C. D., R. S. Fry, J. L. Usry, H. H. Stein. 2021. Copper hydroxychloride improves gain to feed ratio in pigs, but this is not due to improved true total tract digestibility of acid hydrolyzed ether extract. Animal Feed Science and Technology 274: 114839. doi.org/10.1016/j.anifeedsci.2021.114839  Link to full text.

Corn is a cereal grain that is commonly used as a feed ingredient for swine diets due to its excellent palatability, and it can easily be grown on a wide range of environmental conditions. Conventional breeding of corn has generated a new variety (i.e., high-oil corn; Byron Seeds LLC, Rockville, IN), which is believed to contain more oil and crude protein (CP) than conventional corn. It is, therefore, possible that this high-oil corn may be comparable to other cereal grains and may serve as alternative to corn for pigs. However, there are at this point no data to demonstrate the nutritional value of high-oil corn. Therefore, an experiment was conducted to test the hypothesis that the standardized ileal digestibility (SID) of amino acids (AA) in high-oil corn is greater than in conventional corn.

Wei, Xiaoyuan , Kristopher A. Bottoms, Hans H. Stein, Laia Blavi, Casey L. Bradley, Jon Bergstrom, Joshua Knapp, Robert Story, Charles Maxwell, Tsungcheng Tsai, and Jiangchao Zhao. 2021. Dietary Organic Acids Modulate Gut Microbiota and Improve Growth Performance of Nursery Pigs. Microorganisms 2021, 9, 110. doi.org/10.3390/microorganisms9010110.