Nutritional value of soybean meal produced from high protein, low oligosaccharide, or conventional varieties of soybeans and fed to weanling pigs

Three experiments were conducted to evaluate the nutritional value of high protein soybean meal (SBM-HP), low oligosaccharide soybean meal (SBM-LO), and conventional soybean meal (SBM-CV) fed to weanling pigs. The three soybean meals (SBM) contained 549, 536 and 475 g/kg crude protein, respectively. In Exp. 1, the coefficient of ileal standardized digestibility (CISD) of amino acids (AA) in the 3 ingredients was measured using eight barrows (initial body weight: 14.3 ± 1.23 kg) that were equipped with a T-cannula in the distal ileum and allotted to a replicated 4×4 Latin square design with four periods (seven days per period) and four diets per square. Three diets contained SBM-HP, SBM-LO, or SBM-CV as the sole source of AA. The fourth diet was a N-free diet that was used to determine basal ileal endogenous losses of AA. Results indicated that the CISD for all AA was not different among the three varieties of SBM. In Exp. 2, the digestible energy (DE) and metabolizable energy (ME) in the three sources of SBM were determined using 24 barrows (initial body weight: 11.9 ± 1.24 kg) that were placed in metabolism cages and randomly allotted to four diets. A corn-based diet and three diets containing corn and one of the three sources of SBM were formulated. No differences were observed for DE (18.20, 17.92, 18.27, and 17.15 MJ/kg dry matter) and ME (17.31, 16.93, 17.76, and 16.96 MJ/kg dry matter) among SBM-HP, SBM-LO, SBM-CV, and corn. In Exp. 3, a total of 120 weanling barrows (initial body weight: 6.76 ± 2.49 kg) were randomly allotted to three dietary treatments with ten pens per treatment and four pigs per pen. Three diets containing each source of SBM were formulated based on the values for CISD of AA and ME that were calculated in the previous two experiments. No differences were observed during the entire experimental period for average daily gain, average daily feed intake, or gain:feed. Results indicate that the greater concentration of digestible AA in SBM-HP and SBM-LO compared with SBM-CV are effectively utilized by weanling pigs, which implies that the nutritional values of SBM-HP and SBM-LO are greater than that of SBM-CV.