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MEKARN Conference 2010 |
Sixteen growing female pigs (8 Moo Laat and 8 Mong Cai) with an initial weight of 11 to 13 and 25 to 26 kg, respectively, were allocated to a 2*2 factorial arrangement with four replications of four treatments in a Completely Randomized Design (CRD). The factors were: breed of pigs and supplementation with or without rice distillers’ by-product. The basal diet was a mixture of rice bran and fresh water spinach. The diets were offered in amounts based on an expected DM intake of 4 % of live weight. For the control diets (no distillers’ byproduct) the water spinach comprised 30% of the diet DM. For the diets with rice distillers’ by-product the proportions (% DM) were 70, 20 and 10 for rice bran, water spinach and rice distillers’ byproduct, respectively.
Mong Cai pigs grew faster than Moo Laat pigs but the latter tended to have better feed conversion. There was an interaction between breed and rice distillers’ supplementation for DM intake per unit LW and live weight gain. Supplementation increased the intake and growth rate in the Mong Cai pigs. During the 6 weeks of the experiment the Moo Laat pigs fed the rice distillers’ product grew more slowly than those not fed the supplement. During the final 6 weeks the response of the Moo Laat pigs was reversed with higher gains observed for the pigs fed the supplement. Coefficients of digestibility determined by the insoluble ash method were not affected by supplementation with rice distillers’ by-product but appeared to be higher for the Mong Cai compared with the Moo Laat.