Pelleting of diet ingredients: Diet selection and performance in choice-fed growing pigs

An experiment was completed with individually housed growing pigs to examine whether pigs can compose their optimal diet when allowed a choice of three different pellets. Forty cross-bred pigs (20 castrates and 20 gilts) with an initial live weight of 22.0 ± 2.1 kg were allocated to either a complete control diet (C) or to a choice feed diet (CF) during a 4-week period. The C pigs received a complete feed as one pellet, whereas CF pigs could select their diet out of three pellets being: an energy-rich, protein-rich or premix-rest pellet. The CF pigs were offered their pellets in one feeding trough, which was divided in three compartments. All diets were administered ad libitum. Gilts fed the CF diet selected a higher crude protein (CP) diet than barrows (222 and 193 g/kg DM, respectively), whereas the C pigs, both gilts and castrates, were fed a diet with the same CP content (i.e., 204 g/kg DM; treatment by sex interaction; P