Adequacy of Synthetic Diets for Growth and Reproduction of Swine

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Abstract
Newborn pigs suckled their mothers for 2 days and were then reared on a conventional synthetic diet which contained all recognized vitamins except vitamin B12- Intramusc. injns. of the antipernicious anemia liver extract fraction were given to some of the pigs when 9 weeks old, to others when they were 5 days old. The injd. pigs grew more rapidly than did their controls. However, they grew less than half as fast as did pigs that were reared on cow''s milk and it was suggested that milk contains an important unrecognized vitamin in addition to vitamin B12, which is present in purified liver extract. One female pig was continued through the reproductive stage but the diet was apparently inadequate for reproduction. All the pigs had kinked tails and one had a hare-lip. None survived as long as 3 weeks.