Sows are usually fed a single diet during lactation regardless of factors that affect nutrient requirements such as parity, milk production, and litter growth rate. Precision feeding through diet blending can be used to target an individual sow’s nutrient requirement and decrease diet costs compared to traditional feeding strategies. This study evaluated the effects of precision feeding Lys by blending 2 diets, a low and high Lys diet, during lactation on sow and litter performance in commercial production. The results of this study indicate that precision feeding can be used to achieve similar litter growth performance and reduce amino acid intake compared to traditional feeding strategies as long as Lys intake reaches at least 61 g/d. However, future research should focus on using technology to automatically adjust the blends of a low and high Lys diet during lactation based on actual feed intake to avoid underfeeding Lys during lactation.

Read the full article in the Journal of Animal Science.