A comparison of the nutritive values of fish meal and meat meal as protein supplements to barley meal diets for growing pigs

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Abstract
Three experiments were conducted, each involving 4 dietary treatments and 8 replications of Large White × Landrace pigs. Experiment 1 indicated that in barley meal diets of similar protein content sequential replacement of up to half the meat meal by fish meal resulted in significant linear improvements in both the rate and efficiency of gain of pigs growing from 55 to 85 lb live weight, but not thereafter. In Experiment 2 improvements were found in the rate and efficiency of gain between 45 and 85 lb live weight when either half or all the dietary meat meal was replaced by fish meal. Advantages in growth performance due to including fish meal in the diet were not evident after pigs reached 85 lb live weight. In Experiment 3, pigs fed from 45 to 85 lb live weight a barley diet containing meat meal supplemented with 0.5% lysine monohydrochloride grew at a rate and efficiency of gain similar to those of pigs receiving a 50/50 mixture of fish meal and meat meal in their diet. Only in Experiment 2 was there a difference between treatments in the lean content of dissected sample joints. Those from carcasses of pigs which had received fish meal as the sole protein concentrate throughout con:ained more lean than those from pigs which had received either a mixture of meat meal and fish meal in their diet up to 85 lb live weight and then just meat meal, or meat meal alone throughout. They also contained less fat than the latter. A trained taste panel were unable to detect any effect of dietary treatment on the incidence of off-flavour or off-odour in cold roasted joints taken from the carcasses of pigs completing Experiment 1. Although there was some indication in Experiment 2 that as the proportion of fish meal in the diet increased from 0 to 14% the incidence of these characteristics increased, judges were inconsistent in detection.

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