Evaluation of in vivo digestibility and energy concentration of diets for growing and fattening pigs including forage flour from Tithonia diversifolia

Abstract

The research was carried out at the Andrade Agricultural-Farm facilities, located in the Pastaza canton. The study area, located at 900 meters above sea level (masl), has humid subtropical weather, with a relative humidity of 87%, and the temperatures fluctuate between 20 and 28ºC. In order to evaluate the digestibility and energy concentration of four pigs’ diets; dry matter digestibility, crude protein, ethereal extract, organic matter, and pure energy and digestible energy was determined. For this study, forage was harvested at approximately 75 days of maturity, using eight castrated male pigs (60±5 kg live weight). A control diet and three experimental diets were offered with inclusion Tithonia diversifolia forage meal at (0; 10; 15 and 20%) levels.  The animals stayed in individual metabolic cages. The adaptation period was between seven and ten days of stool collection. At the beginning of each experimental period, the animals were weighed to adjust their feeding consumption to the 0.10 kg DM/kg0.75 level. The diets used in the study were iso-proteic and iso-energetic. There were no significant differences (p<0.05) found between the diets for ethereal extract digestibility and energy concentrations. The results obtained for diet digestibilities in the evaluated diets, according to the inclusion levels of T. diversifolia flour, were: crude energy (0.75; 0.70; 0.70 and 0.68 %), dry matter (0.75; 0.69; 0.69 and 0.67 %), organic matter (0.75; 0.64; 0.54 and 0.64 %) and crude protein (0.74; 0.59; 0.57 and 0.57 %), respectively. Energy levels and organic matter digestibility suggest the use of T. diversifolia forage flour in growing pigs’ diets at up to 15% inclusion and up to 20% for fattening growing pigs.