By Joel DeRouchey, Ethan Stas, Mike Tokach, Jason Woodworth, Bob Goodband, Jordan Gebhardt and Katelyn Gaffield. Kansas State University
Wheat is a major cereal grain utilized in swine diets across the world. Wheat typically serves as a main cereal grain in Canadian, European and Australian swine diets. Wheat is used many parts of the U.S. and is incorporated more widely depending on availability and cost.
Wheat has several attributes that make it help it beneficial when formulating into a swine diet.
• Wheat contains higher levels of crude protein and amino acids compared to most other cereal grains. This allows for less soybean meal inclusion in the diet. Wheat’s standardized ileal digestibility (SID) of amino acids is similar to corn, but greater than barley and sorghum.
• Phosphorus content of wheat is 0.27% and has very high digestible P because it contains intrinsic phytase. The standardized total tract digestible P in wheat is 0.218%, whereas corn is only 0.088% (NRC, 2012).
• While historical data reported wheat had an energy value of 91 to 97% of corn, data generated from 2014 to 2020 suggests that wheat’s mean energy content is 99 and 98% of the energy of corn for DE and ME, respectively. Therefore, wheat can be utilized at a similar rate as corn without a major decrease in the diet energy density.
• Pelleted wheat diets have been found to have significantly greater pellet durability index by 33.1% units compared to corn-based diets. Even if wheat is not utilized as the main cereal grain, it can be incorporated into diets as a pelleting aid.
Off-Quality Wheat
Off-quality wheat that cannot be used by the flour milling industry can be utilized in swine diets. However, this type of wheat is often associated with physical abnormalities or contamination that affect its nutritional value compared to regular wheat.
Sprouted Wheat
Poor weather conditions can result in germination and sprouting of wheat kernels before they are able to be harvested and are not suitable for the flour milling industry. Activity of α-amylase, which is responsible for starch breakdown, increases in sprouted wheat. Therefore, the energy content of sprouted wheat may decrease depending on the severity of sprouting. There is very limited data with the growth effects of sprouted wheat in swine diets and it is recommended to blend sprouted wheat with non-sprouted wheat or other cereal grain.
Low Test Weight
Poor growing conditions, high moisture during the growing season, insect damage, and sprout damage can result in low test-weight wheat. Normal wheat test weight is typically around 58 to 60 lb./bu. depending on the class of wheat. Low test-weight wheat is characterized at or below 51 lb./bu. Data suggested that wheat’s energy content should be decreased by approximately 5% when bushel weight is 51 lb. or lower.
New factsheets that summarize modern data were recently developed for use of wheat, off-quality wheat and wheat co-products in swine diets.
