The Effect of Creep Feeding and Nursery Diet Complexity on Growth Performance and Nutrient Digestibility

Suckling piglet growth is dependent on sow milk production. Increased litter size limits milk intake of individual piglets, but creep feeds or milk replacers can be provided as additional nutrient sources and may have benefits post-weaning. This study’s objective was to determine if providing creep feed improved growth and the utilization of low complexity diets post-weaning. Fifty-six gilt litters of 12 piglets were recruited. At five days of age, litters were assigned to one of four creep feeding regimens: commercial creep feed (COM), liquid milk replacer (LMR), pelleted milk replacer (PMR), or no creep feed (NO); creep feeds contained 1% brilliant blue as a fecal marker. Individual weights and fecal swabs were collected every 3 days to identify piglets as creep feed consumers. At weaning (21 days of age), six pigs that consumed creep feed were placed on either a HIGH (contained highly digestible animal proteins) or LOW (contained corn and soybean meal as main protein sources) complexity nursery diet in a three-phase feeding program for 38 days.

The LMR disappeared at the greatest rate (37.7 vs. 10.8±1.5g/pig/d; P<0.05; DM-basis), had the greatest proportion of creep feed consumers (85 vs. 59±0.4%; P<0.05), and the greatest body weight at weaning (6.3 vs. 5.9±0.14kg). During the nursery period, growth performance was unaffected by creep feeding regimen but pigs fed the LOW diet had reduced average daily gain (25.1 vs. 27.7±0.4g/kg BW/d; P<0.001), gain:feed (0.75 vs. 0.81±0.02; P<0.01), and exit body weight (21.2 vs 24.4±0.6kg; P<0.001) versus pigs fed the HIGH diet. At the end of the study, pigs fed LOW nursery diets had lower villus height:crypt depth (1.5 vs. 1.8±0.51; P<0.05), but apparent total tract digestibility of organic matter and energy were unaffected by creep feeding or nursery diet regimen. In conclusion, LMR provided during the suckling period resulted in heavier weaning weight but did not improve post-weaning growth or utilization of low complexity nursery diets.

Key words: creep feed, milk replacer, diet complexity, pigs.

Presented at the 2021 Animal Nutrition Conference of Canada. For information on the next edition, click here.