[Energy utilization by swine of nutritive fiber-rich by-products from the milling and food industry].

Growing pigs (from 20 to 80 kg body weight) were fed diets containing equal amounts of soybean, pea (pisum sativum), millet and barley hulls as well as a mixture of these fibre sources. The effects of these fibrous components on the digestibility of energy and nutrients were investigated. Although some rations had a similar nutrient composition, important differences in the digestibility of energy could be observed: e.g. soybean hulls and pea hulls had a similar content in crude fibre but differed in the digestibility of energy by a factor 1:2. The difference in the digestibility of energy was even more pronounced between the rations with soybean hulls and millet hulls (factor 1:11, respectively) although the crude fibre and ADF fibre content were similar. Therefore the magnitude of the difference in digestibility of energy shows a considerable variation between the fibre sources. This seems to be caused partially by differences in the chemical nature of the fibrous by-products. Soybean hulls and barley hulls proved to be very well suited for growing pigs (11.4 MJ DE/kg DM and 10.0 MJ DE/kg DM, respectively). The pea hulls showed a mean content of digestible energy (5.6 MJ DE/kg DM) whereas the millet hulls (1.1 MJ DE/kg DM) didn't contribute significantly to the energy supply of the pigs.