Effects of dietary betaine on ileal and faecal digestibilities and intestinal microbial fermentation of crude fibre in piglets

摘要

Dietary betaine supplementation has been shown to increase fibre digestibilities in piglets (Eklund eta/., 2006). In the current study we investigated the effects of betaine on ileal and faecal digestibilities and the microbial fermentation of crude fibre (CF) in weaned pigs.Four five-week-old barrows (German Landrace x Pietrain, initial body weight (BW) of 8.6+1.3 kg) were surgically fitted with T-cannulas at the distal ileum. The basal diet consisted of barley, wheat and soybean meal (13.88 MJ DE/kg; 11 g/kg lysine; 37 g/kg CF). The basal diet was fed either alone (Control) or supplemented with 0.45 % anhydrous betaine (Betaine). The feed allowance was restricted to 4.5% of individual BW Following seven days of adaptation to the experimental diets, faecal and ileal nutrient digestibilities and microbial parameters were assessed via four repeated measurements with two pigs per treatment resulting in a total of eight observations per treatment. The data were analyzed using the MIXED procedure of SAS (SAS Inc). Errors of repeated measurements on the same subject (animal within treatment) were assumed to be serially correlated.