Jason Woodworth, a swine nutritionist at Kansas State University, explains that feed accounts for 70% of the costs in swine production. One way to reduce these costs is by replacing traditional protein sources like soybean meal with synthetic amino acids. However, this can cause imbalances in amino acid levels, which led Woodworth and his team to study how to create cost-effective diets for pigs without affecting their growth and efficiency.

Their findings will be shared at the annual K-State Swine Day on Nov. 21, with registration available online until Nov. 13.

K-State graduate student Jessica Smallfield conducted several feeding trials to explore how the ratio of digestible lysine to crude protein affects young pigs’ growth. She found that pigs fed diets with higher lysine percentages performed better. She also compared diets using soybean meal and distiller’s dried grains (DDGs) and found that pigs fed DDGs didn’t grow as well.

“We found that pigs fed the diets with DDGs did not perform as well,” Smallfield said. “The findings from the first two studies contributed to a third trial where we added different non-protein nitrogen sources to the diets.”

The research team also tested adding non-protein nitrogen sources to help improve feed efficiency, as reducing crude protein can cause nitrogen deficiencies. They found that maintaining the right digestible lysine to crude protein ratio helped improve performance and reduce growth limitations.

In addition, the researchers studied gut health and found that pigs fed the right amino acid ratios had better gut conditions, less diarrhea, and more efficient growth. These improvements also led to better waste management and less nitrogen waste, which is better for the environment and sustainability.