Rethinking swine starters

Pellet-cooker-processed swine starter feeds made by the Cehave Landbouwbelang co-op in the Netherlands—the Air Line product range—average 10-15% lower bulk density than conventional pelleted products. However, they can be more feed efficient overall, while generating less manure.


Focus on novel processing techniques

Research has shown that technologies for pelleting feed differ in their effect on dietary performance. In Europe, practicing swine nutritionists designed a range of nursery pig diets based on specifi c processing technology with the goal to optimize conditions for digestion in the stomach and small intestine and for fermentation in the lower gut.

Most manufactured rations for baby pigs are processed through a conventional steam-conditioned, compression pelleting process. These typically high-protein, high-fat products may be in the form of small diameter pellets or crumbles.

Conventional compression pelleting technology usually applies even to hygienic nursery feeds in which the mash may be pasteurized during steam-conditioning under pressure in an expander or through a longer retention time at atmospheric pressure. Some ‘creep’ products are manufactured in the same way, designed for the feeding piglets in the farrowing crate during the last several days of nursing. During the fi rst few such feedings, the
pelleted product may even be moistened by hand, making it more aromatic and softer in order to increase intake.

These creative adjustments of conventional pelleted feeds for young pigs have illustrated the critical need to provide a smooth transition from sow’s milk to dry feed in order to reduce ‘weaning lag’ and optimize the pig’s growth potential.

Increasingly, however, feed manufacturers are looking closely at the form of the feed for pre-starter and starter feeds, including the processing technology used to produce such products. Their attention to the feed form accounts for the increasing use of ‘pellet-cooker’ feed processing, which contrasts signifi cantly with conventional steam-conditioned pelleting for the manufacture of feeds for young pigs (see box).


Stomach effects of feed processing




European approach

The use of pellet-cooker technology for pig starter feeds got its start in western Europe, where there is intense competition among commercial swine nutrition products. Leading the way was the Cehave Landbouwbelang Group (www.cehave.nl), a leading cooperative organization in the agri-food business based in the Netherlands. Cehave has about 11,000 members, including many pig producers, and operates feed plants in the Netherlands, Belgium, and Poland.

The Cehave plants produce a wide range of feed products, totaling more than 2.5 million tons of feed per year. The co-op’s Cehave International division (www.vitamex.com) also focuses on complete feeds, concentrates, and premixes. The organization’s Nutricontrol division is comprised of feed and food safety and quality control laboratories serving Cehave and other feed and food makers under contract. Likewise, Cehave’s CCL division focuses on feed and food research, including feed studies for pigs, poultry, and beef cattle at the division’s Laverdonk research farm in the Netherlands.
At CCL Research (www.ccl.nl), a multi-disciplinary team, led by research director Ruud Tijssens, began in 1998 to design diets around the pellet-cooker process. The Dutch feed scientists did not simply take a formula from the pellet line and start making it on the new equipment. For their pig starter product, they sought particular characteristics that would derive from the product’s processing.


Stomach condition

Particularly, the pellet-cooker’s very short-term, high-temperature processing was supposed to improve conditions in the stomach, favoring enzyme activity and digestion, and reducing risk of stomach disease. Stomach condition scores of pigs fed diets processed by pellet-cooker or conventional pelleting equipment bore out this approach (see figure).

Particularly, the pellet-cooker’s very short-term, high-temperature processing was supposed to improve conditions in the stomach, favoring enzyme activity and digestion, and reducing risk of stomach disease. Stomach condition scores of pigs fed diets processed by pellet-cooker or conventional pelleting equipment bore out this approach (see figure).

Ultimately, the CCL researchers found the pellet-cooker-designed product offered faster growth in young pigs—roughly a 25-gram advantage through the starter phase—as well as better feed conversion (up to 6% better feed-to-gain). The pellet-cooker-fed pigs also had nearly 1% less mortality and the researchers remarked on more uniform growth among groups of pigs as well as healthier appearance of the pigs, particularly
their color.

An important characteristic of the pellet cooker pig feeds tested at CCL was their lower bulk density—in the range of 520 g/l versus 650 g/l for conventionally pelleted feeds. The Dutch scientists suggested that this characteristic promoted faster feed hydration in the pig stomach—up to 6 times faster than for the denser pelleted feed. As a result, the pigs consumed less water, resulting in more solid manure. The pig housing units at Laverdonk were drier, manure was easier to remove, and pig houses were quicker to clean. So, the Dutch researchers reasoned, although the typical feed delivery truck may not be able to haul as much product by weight as for a conventional pelleted feed, the pellet-cooker-processed feed was more efficient in feeding and there was less waste to clean up. As a result, efficiencies were higher overall.


Cost consideration

In the last half of 2003, Cehave introduced the Air Line range of pig feed products, which were manufactured by pellet-cooker. These innovative products were the result of extensive process-formulation research involving some 15,000 pigs over several years.


The cost considerations related to this range of products, as explained by Cehave, were particularly interesting. For example:

• For nursery feeds, pellet-cooker products were priced $9.00 per ton more than standard pelleted nursery feeds;
• For the next stage of starter feeds, pellet-cooker products were priced $4.20 per ton more;
• Despite these higher feed costs, the pig feed customers’ profits were $3.40 per pig more for those fed the pellet-cooker products compared to a standard pelleted feed.

Today, swine starter feeds can benefit from ‘rethinking’—going beyond consideration only of ingredients in developing innovative products. For example, although the pellet-cooking process itself may be more energy intensive than conventional steam-conditioned pelleting, there are overriding energy-related efficiencies.

The pellet-cooker product offers greater feed efficiency, which means less to feed as well as less manure to handle. In this time of higher energy costs, such process-related savings can translate to overall savings to pig feed customers over conventional pellets.



Equipment configuration

A pellet-cooker confi guration consists of a live-bottom feeder supplying a steam- injected, differential-diameter, twin-shaft paddle conditioner, which feeds a short- barrel, single-screw extruder. The extruder pushes processed feed mash through a special compression die where the cutter head forms discrete expanded-compressed pellets. These pellets have signifi cantly greater liquid absorption capacity than conventional steam-conditioned, compressed pellets.

The patented process and equip ment of the Universal Pellet/Cooker® or UP/C® make it practical to produce a broad range of high-quality, pasteurized feeds, including high-fat rations, on a single machine. Depending upon the feed formula, process offers pellets as small as 2 mm with bulk densities in the range of 500-700 grams per liter and product moisture of 14-18% at the die, prior to drying and cooling.

Again, depending upon the formula, the pellet-cooker achieves starch gelatinization in the range of 60-80% and pellet durability superior to comparable systems.

A particular advantage of the ‘expanded-compressed’ product form for feeds for young pigs is the porous micro-cell structure which allows better absorption of liquid ingredients.

This structure results from a laminar or layered micro-structure and very brief exposure to high process temperatures.

The pellet-cooker can produce pasteurized pig feeds based on a broader range of raw materials compared with conventional feed pelleting systems—including expander-plus-pellet mill variations—and extrusion systems.

Production of pellets in the range of 2-4 mm for pigs eliminates the need to crumble larger pellets, while the very brief exposure to high temperatures reduces loss of key nutrients, particularly vitamins, enzymes, and amino acids.

The pellet-cooker can produce pasteurized pig feeds based on a broader range of raw materials compared with conventional feed pelleting systems—including expander-plus-pellet mill variations—and extrusion systems.

Production of pellets in the range of 2-4 mm for pigs eliminates the need to crumble larger pellets, while the very brief exposure to high temperatures reduces loss of key nutrients, particularly vitamins, enzymes, and amino acids.