Comparison of apparent ileal and total tract digestibility of calcium in calcium sources for pigs

Two experiments were conducted to compare apparent ileal digestibility (AID) and apparent total tract digestibility (ATTD) of calcium (Ca) in pigs. In Exp. 1, three semi-purified diets with soybean meal, canola meal or sunflower meal as the sole source of Ca were formulated. Eighteen cannulated pigs (initial BW = 66 Âą 5 kg) were assigned in a randomized complete block design to 3 treatments and 6 replicates per treatment. Results indicated that for either Ca or phosphorus (P), the ATTD was not different from AID in three diets (Psite = 0.16 and 0.81 respectively). In Exp. 2, diets with four Ca concentrations were formulated with calcium carbonate as the Ca source. Sixteen cannulated pigs (initial BW = 73 Âą 4 kg) were assigned in a randomized complete block design to 4 treatments in 2 experimental periods. The results indicated that the ATTD of Ca was not different from AID for all diets. Furthermore, the Ca digestibility was not affected by the dietary treatments, but P digestibility was linearly improved (PThe accepted manuscript in pdf format is listed with the files at the bottom of this page. The presentation of the authors' names and (or) special characters in the title of the manuscript may differ slightly between what is listed on this page and what is listed in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript; that in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript is what was submitted by the author