Effect of dietary net energy concentrations on growth performance and net energy intake of growing gilts

Objective: This experiment investigated the effect of dietary net energy (NE) concentrations on growth performance and NE intake of growing gilts. Methods: Five diets were formulated to contain 9.6, 10.1, 10.6, 11.1, and 11.6 MJ NE/kg, respectively. A metabolism trial with 10 growing pigs (average body weight [BW] = $15.9{\pm}0.24kg$) was conducted to determine NE concentrations of 5 diets based on French and Dutch NE systems in a $5{\times}5$ replicated Latin square design. A growth trial also was performed with five dietary treatments and 12 replicates per treatment using 60 growing gilts (average BW = $15.9{\pm}0.55kg$) for 28 days. A regression analysis was performed to predict daily NE intake from the BW of growing gilts. Results: Increasing NE concentrations of diets did not influence average daily gain and average daily feed intake of growing gilts. There was a quadratic relationship (p = 0.01) between dietary NE concentrations and feed efficiency (G:F), although the difference in G:F among treatment means was relatively small. Regression analysis revealed that daily NE intake was linearly associated with the BW of growing gilts. The prediction equations for NE intake with the BW of growing gilts were: NE intake (MJ/d) = $1.442+(0.562{\times}BW,kg)$, $R^2=0.796$ when French NE system was used, whereas NE intake (MJ/d) = $1.533+(0.614{\times}BW,kg)$, $R^2=0.810$ when Dutch NE system was used. Conclusion: Increasing NE concentrations of diets from 9.6 to 11.6 MJ NE/kg have little impacts on growth performance of growing gilts. Daily NE intake can be predicted from the BW between 15 and 40 kg in growing gilts.