Creep Feeding in the Farrowing Room: Do the Outcomes Depend on Weaning Age?

06 August 2014

On leaving the nursery, piglets offered creep feed for one week prior to weaning were heavier than those that had no access to feed, regardless of weaning age (three- versus four-week weaning), Janice Shea and Denise Beaulieu of the Prairie Swine Centre told delegates at the Centralia Swine Research Update 2014.

Summary

Creep feed could benefit older weaned piglets by supplementing nutrients in sows’ milk.

Additionally, it could aid the transition to solid feed at weaning, perhaps more of a benefit to the younger weaned piglet.

In this experiment, bodyweight at nursery exit was greater in piglets offered creep feed for one week prior to weaning, regardless of weaning age (three- versus four-week weaning).

However, less than four per cent of the piglets weaned at three weeks of age showed evidence of creep feed consumption.

Introduction

Offering supplemental feed in the farrowing room (creep feeding) is thought to benefit piglets by:

providing supplemental nutrition
introducing piglets to solid feed prior to weaning and
adapting the gastrointestinal tract to nutrients not found in the sow’s milk.

In 2010, however, the authors reported that providing creep feed for seven days prior to weaning did not improve litter performance post-weaning and this was irrespective of piglet weaning weight (Beaulieu et al., 2010 Annual Report; Weaning at 28 days: Is creep feeding beneficial?).

They followed this up with a study in which they tracked consumption of creep feed and phase one diet by individual piglets. This study demonstrated that, while only a small proportion of piglets consumed creep feed during the seven days pre-weaning, those who did had improved growth performance throughout the nursery period (Beaulieu et al., 2011 Annual Report; Creep feed provision in the farrowing room provides benefits to piglets showing evidence of intake).

The present study aims to expand on these findings by investigating whether the benefits of creep feeding depend on weaning age.

Materials and Methods

This experiment consisted of four treatments in a 2×2 factorial arrangement. The factors were: provision, or not, of creep feed in the farrowing room and weaning at three or four weeks of age.

For piglets assigned to receive it, creep feed was made continuously available in a multi-space creep feeder (Figure 1) for seven days prior to weaning. Both the creep feed and the phase one nursery diet were marked with an inert food dye (Brilliant Blue and ferric oxide (red), respectively).

Figure 1. Configuration of the creep feeder used in the experiment

Anal swabs taken from the piglets receiving creep feed one day prior to weaning and from all piglets two days post-weaning allowed us to relate post-weaning growth performance to consumption of creep feed and to explore whether consumption of creep feed pre-weaning encourages consumption of phase one diet immediately post-weaning.

Results and Discussion

As expected, piglets weaned at three weeks weighed less at weaning than those weaned at four weeks (P<0.0001; Table 1). This pattern persisted through the first 14 days post-weaning (P<0.0001); however, by nursery exit (at eight weeks of age, regardless of age at weaning) piglets weaned at three weeks were heavier than those weaned at four weeks (P<0.05; Table 1).

Performance parameter	Weaning age		Creep status		SEM	P-values
Table 1. Effects of weaning age (3 versus 4 weeks) and the provision of creep feed in farrowing pens on post-weaning growth performance of piglets^a
	3 weeks	4 weeks	Creep^b	No creep		Age	Creep	Age × creep
No. of litters	40	40	40	40
No. of piglets	435	442	430	447
Bodyweight (kg)
- Day 7^c	3.79	5.24	4.56	4.47	0.12	<0.0001	0.55	0.66
- Weaning (day 0)	5.51	6.96	6.33	6.13	0.13	<0.0001	0.26	0.78
- Day 7 post-wean	6.15	7.87	7.18	6.84	0.14	<0.0001	0.07	0.68
- Day 14 post-wean	7.81	9.92	9.15	8.59	0.18	<0.0001	0.03	0.5
- Nursery exit^d	20.04	18.50	19.90	18.64	0.38	0.01	0.01	0.91
Average daily gain (kg)
- 7 days pre-weaning	0.24	0.25	0.26	0.23	0.25	0.85	0.02	0.63
- Days 0 to 7	0.09	0.13	0.12	0.10	0.01	0.001	0.03	0.06
- Days 7 to 14	0.22	0.30	0.28	0.25	0.01	0.0002	0.01	0.29
- Days 0 to nursery exit	0.40	0.40	0.42	0.38	0.01	0.61	0.01	0.65
Average daily feed intake (kg)
- Days 0 to 7	0.10	0.13	0.13	0.10	0.003	<0.0001	<0.0001	0.01
- Days 7 to 14	0.26	0.33	0.31	0.28	0.005	<0.0001	<0.0001	0.0004
- Days 0 to nursery exit	0.52	0.49	0.52	0.49	0.01	0.001	<0.0001	0.24
Gain:feed ratio (kg/kg)
- Days 0 to 7	0.96	1.02	0.96	1.02	0.06	0.57	0.42	0.56
- Days 7 to 14	0.89	0.88	0.90	0.88	0.03	0.79	0.66	0.49
- Days 0 to nursery exit	0.78	0.81	0.80	0.79	0.01	0.17	0.63	0.81
a Data presented as litter averages. b Includes data from all litters to which creep feed was offered, regardless of whether individual piglets showed evidence of creep feed consumption. c Creep feed was made available to those litters assigned to receive it for 7 days prior to weaning. d All piglets exited the nursery at 8 weeks of age, regardless of age at weaning.

The provision of creep feed in the farrowing room did not affect piglet bodyweight at weaning and there were no creep feed by weaning age interactions (P>0.50; Table 1). Growth (P<0.05) and average daily feed intake (P<0.0001) of piglets who had been offered creep feed in the farrowing crate were greater than those who had not and piglets who had been offered creep feed in the farrowing room were heavier at nursery exit than piglets not offered creep feed (P≤0.01; Table 1).

In the three-week weaning age group, only eight piglets (four per cent) showed evidence of having consumed creep feed; whereas 73 four-week weaned piglets (34 per cent) showed evidence of having consumed creep feed (Table 2).

Performance parameter	Treatment
Table 2. Effects of creep feed consumption^a on growth performance of piglets weaned at 3 or 4 weeks of age
	Weaned at 3 weeks		Weaned at 4 weeks		Main effects of creep
	Creep feed "eater"	Creep feed "non-eater"	Creep feed "eater"	Creep feed "non-eater"	Creep feed "eater"	Creep feed "non-eater"
No. of piglets	8	206	73	143	81	349
Bodyweight (kg)
- Birth	1.51	1.79	1.62	1.68	1.61	1.75
- Day 7^b	3.43	3.89	5.22	5.00	5.04	4.35
- Weaning (day 0)	5.11	5.66	7.02	6.74	6.83	6.10
- Day 7	5.74	6.30	8.37	7.65	8.11	6.86
- Day 14	7.64	7.94	10.88	9.70	10.56	8.66
- Nursery exit^c	20.14	20.53	19.97	18.07	19.99	19.53
Average daily gain (kg)
- Day -7 to 0	0.24	0.25	0.26	0.25	0.26	0.25
- Days 0 to 7	0.09	0.09	0.19	0.13	0.18	0.11
- Days 7 to 14	0.27	0.23	0.36	0.29	0.35	0.25
- Days 0 to nursery exit	0.42	0.41	0.45	0.39	0.44	0.40
Average daily feed intake (kg)
- Days 0 to 7	0.11	0.10	0.15	0.14	0.15	0.12
- Days 7 to 14	0.26	0.26	0.38	0.36	0.36	0.30
- Days 0 to nursery exit	0.53	0.52	0.52	0.51	0.52	0.52
Gain:feed ratio (kg/kg)
- Days 0 to 7	0.90	0.92	1.25	0.89	1.22	0.91
- Days 7 to 14	1.05	0.89	0.94	0.80	0.95	0.85
- Days 0 to nursery exit	0.79	0.79	0.85	0.76	0.85	0.78
a Data-set includes only those piglets that were offered creep feed. Data unbalanced and not analysed statistically. b Creep feed was provided from day -7 to day 0, i.e. for the week prior to weaning. c All piglets exited the nursery at 8 weeks of age, irrespective of their age at weaning.

Creep feed disappeared at a rate of 57g per litter per day for litters weaned at three weeks of age and 203g per litter per day for litters weaned at four weeks of age (P<0.0001). Within the three-week weaned piglets, creep-feed “eaters” were the lighter birthweight piglets. Although these piglets had a greater rate of bodyweight gain during the second week in the nursery, they were still lighter than the “non-eaters” at nursery exit (Table 2).

Piglets weaned at four weeks of age, identified as “eaters” of creep feed had greater rates of bodyweight gain throughout the nursery phase than those identified as “non-eaters” of creep feed. Piglets which consumed creep feed in the farrowing crate were heavier, both at weaning and at nursery exit than those who did not (Table 2).

Within the three-week weaning age group, 84 piglets (19 per cent) showed evidence of having consumed phase one diet within the first 24 hours post-weaning; whereas 142 (32 per cent) of four-week weaned piglets showed evidence of having consumed phase one diet within the first 24 hours post-weaning.

Irrespective of creep feed status in the farrowing room, consumption of phase one diet within 24 hours of weaning was associated with improved rates of bodyweight gain during the first week in the nursery in both three- and four-week weaned piglets.

In four-week weaned piglets, this improvement in average daily gain persisted throughout the nursery period (0.42 versus 0.38kg per day for “eaters” and “non-eaters” of phase one, respectively), such that four-week weaned piglets which consumed phase one diet within 24 hours post-weaning were heavier at nursery exit than those who did not (19.01 versus 18.07kg, respectively).

Conclusions

Creep feeding in the farrowing room improved the weaning and nursery exit weights of the piglets who actually consumed it.

Although the benefits of creep feeding were similar in piglets weaned at three or four weeks of age, there was a dramatic difference in the number of piglets that consumed the offered creep feed. Further research into ways of encouraging creep feed consumption among piglets is required.

Acknowledgement: The authors thank Masterfeeds for donating the creep feed used in this experiment. Strategic funding provided to the Prairie Swine Centre by Sask Pork, Alberta Pork, the Manitoba Pork Council, Ontario Pork and the Saskatchewan Agriculture and Food Development Fund is gratefully acknowledged.

Reference

Shea J. and D. Beaulieu 2014. Creep feeding in the farrowing room: Do the outcomes depend on weaning age? Proceedings of 33rd Centralia Swine Research Update. II-44–II-47.

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