Nutritive Value of Germinated and Ungerminated High Tannin Sorghum for Growing Pigs

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Abstract
Three experiments were conducted to evaluate the nutritive value of sorghum var. serena known to be a high tannin variety (HTS). In the first experiment 16 female pigs weighing 23.5 kg on average were allotted to 2 dietary treatments; germinated and ungerminated sorghum diets. The experiment lasted for 5 weeks during which time, feed intake and growth rate were measured. Growth rate, feed intake, and feed conversion ratio were not affected by treatment. In a second balance experiment with pigs it was shown that digestibility was not significantly affected by germination. A third experiment was conducted using Wistar male rats to determine true protein digestibility (TD), biological value (BV), net protein utilization (NPU) and digestible energy (DE) of sorghum. BV, NPU and DE were reduced by sprouting. Chemical analyses revealed also that dry matter (DM), ether extract (EE) and ash were reduced after sprouting. The average daily gains obtained from the sorghum diets are comparable to values obtained with other cereal sources. The results indicate that germination is not an effective way of improving pig performance through reduction of tannin levels in serena sorghum.