188 Effects of an antioxidant support technology and vitamin E on growth performance of naturally health-challenged nursery pigs

Abstract

The effects of an antioxidant support technology (AOX, Promote® AOX™; Provimi, Brookville, OH) in diets with different levels of vitamin E (VIT-E) were evaluated. A total of 1,848 naturally health-challenged (determined by ~2% higher than the yearly average barn mortality) pigs (~19 d of age; 5.9 ± 0.4 kg), 14 pens/treatment, and 22 pigs/pen were housed in two barns which were blocked separately by pen location and randomly allocated to treatments. Treatments were arranged as a 2 × 3 factorial with three levels of AOX (0, 0.02, 0.13%) and two levels of VIT-E (35 or 100 IU/kg). Pen weights were obtained on d 0, 7, 21, and 40 post-weaning. Growth performance and mortalities and removals were evaluated. Constructed contrasts were: 0 vs additional AOX (aggregate effect of 0.02 and 0.13 AOX), 0.02 vs 0.13 AOX, 35 vs 100 VIT-E, and all possible interactions. Overall (d 0 to 40), interactions were observed (P < 0.05) between additional AOX and VIT-E level for d 40 BW (35 VIT-E: 22.0, 22.3, 22.8 kg; 100 VIT-E: 23.0, 22.8, 22.3 kg), ADG (35 VIT-E: 0.39, 0.40, 0.42 kg/d; 100 VIT-E: 0.42, 0.41, 0.40 kg/d), ADFI (35 VIT-E: 0.52, 0.52, 0.54 kg/d; 100 VIT-E: 0.55, 0.54, 0.52 kg/d, and return over feed cost (ROFC; 35 VIT-E: $27.16, 27.62, 28.29; 100 VIT-E: $28.83, 28.31, 27.50). Additionally, interactions were observed (P < 0.05) between AOX level, when increased from 0.02 to 0.13%, and VIT-E level for ADG, ADFI, ROFC, and probability for mortality and removals (35 VIT-E: 10.4, 13.6, 6.5%; 100 VIT-E: 8.4, 10.0, 9.7%). Level of AOX or VIT-E did not impact cost/kg of gain or feed efficiency (P > 0.10). Including AOX in 35 IU/kg VIT-E diets improved growth performance parameters and reduced probability for mortality and removals, but not in diets containing 100 IU/kg VIT-E.