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Covering the nutrient requirements during pregnancy and lactation is crucial to ensure the optimal performance of sows in the long term. Accordingly, sows with a low energy intake during gestation show reduced pregnancy rates and embryonic survivals. A strategy suggested to overcome such adverse effects is to increase the energy density of the diets for sows during gestation. Therefore, high-energy or high-fat diets are often used during gestation and lactation in order to cover the energy requirements of high-prolific sows. However, their long-term consumption has the potential to impair the reproductive and lactational traits in sows. The microalga Arthrospira plantensis, rich in bioactive compounds, has been described to exert beneficial health effects, and it may potentially reverse the detrimental effects induced by a high-energy diet. The present study investigated the effects of a high-energy diet and Arthrospira plantensis intake during gestation and lactation in pigs. Twenty-four primiparous crossbred sows were fed either a high-energy diet or a control diet. Half of the sows per group were supplemented with 20 g/day of Arthrospira plantensis.
Despite a higher gross energy intake, consuming the high-energy diets did not affect the sows’ reproductive and lactational performance but significantly modified the colostrum fatty acid composition and tended to decrease the number of weaned piglets. The Arthrospira plantensis supplementation did not affect the reproduction and lactation traits, but slightly affected the colostrum fatty acid composition. A trend was observed for an interaction of diet and Arthrospira plantensis in terms of offspring sex ratio with a 50% lower male-to-female ratio in the high-energy diet group compared to all other animals.
These findings suggest that a high-energy diet and Arthrospira plantensis intake hardly influence reproduction in sows. However, the high-energy diet modified the colostrum fatty acid composition, whereas the Arthrospira plantensis had only fewer effects, which may potentially affect offspring performance.
Lugarà R, Grześkowiak Ł, Zentek J, Meese S, Kreuzer M, Giller K. A High-Energy Diet and Spirulina Supplementation during Pre-Gestation, Gestation, and Lactation do Not Affect the Reproductive and Lactational Performance of Primiparous Sows. Animals. 2022; 12(9): 1171. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani12091171
