Commercial validation of the true ileal digestible lysine requirement for eleven- to twenty-seven-kilogram pigs.

Five experiments utilizing 3,628 pigs were conducted to determine the true ileal digestible (TID) Lys requirement for 11- to 27-kg pigs fed corn-soybean meal diets. In Exp. 1, 216 barrows (initial BW = 11.5 kg) were used, with dietary TID Lys levels from 1.05 to 1.40% TID Lys (0.07% increments). All diets were isocaloric (3.42 Mcal of ME) and contained the same inclusion of soybean meal (33.1%). Dietary Lys content was increased by adding graded levels of L-Lys.HCl (0.0 to 0.445%), with other crystalline AA supplied to meet minimum AA-to-Lys ratios. For the 21-d period, ADG and G:F increased linearly (P < 0.001) with increasing Lys levels. Experiments 2 through 5 were each conducted in different commercial research facilities. In Exp. 2, a 5-point titration (1.05 to 1.41% TID Lys; 0.09% increments) was used containing the same level of soybean meal (34.3%), with graded levels of L-Lys.HCl addition as in Exp. 1 for a 16-d period. Exp. 3 used similar diets, but was a 28-d period from 11.8 to 28 kg. There were linear increases in ADG (P < 0.01) and G:F (P < 0.01) with increasing dietary Lys in both experiments. On the basis of these results, 2 additional 28-d experiments were conducted with similar diets, except for 1 additional level at 1.50% TID Lys. In Exp. 4, linear increases (P < 0.01) in ADG and G:F were observed from d 0 to 14. From d 14 to 28, there were quadratic increases (P < 0.04) in ADG and G:F, which resulted in quadratic increases (P < 0.01) in ADG and G:F with increasing dietary Lys for the entire 28-d period. Similarly, in Exp. 5, there were linear increases (P < 0.01) in growth performance from d 0 to 14, but there were quadratic increases in G:F (P < 0.001) with increasing dietary Lys for the overall period. Data from all 5 experiments yielded a single-slope, broken-line response, with requirement estimates for TID Lys of 1.33 and 1.35% for 11- to 19-kg pigs. The 5 experiments gave requirement estimates of 1.30% TID Lys (3.80 g of TID Lys/Mcal of ME) for 11- to 27-kg pigs, equivalent to 19 g of TID Lys/kg of gain.