Recent reductions in the cost of canola meal combined with a reduced availability of feed peas and lentils have created opportunity for pork producers to save money by including canola meal in their swine rations.

Dr Denise Beaulieu, a research scientist nutrition with the Prairie Swine Centre, says the main goal when we feed a pig is to get the best performance at the lowest cost, so each time an ingredient changes we try to reformulate our entire ration to see how pulling more of that ingredient into the ration affects the nutritional composition because, despite changing costs, we still have to meet the nutrient requirements of the pig.

Dr Denise Beaulieu-Prairie Swine Centre

Canola meal especially here in western Canada can be a very good source of protein for the growing pig.

Canola meal is lower in energy, higher in fibre and lower in crude protien than soybean meal which is typically what we would be substituting in a ration for.

However using good numbers for the canola meal and properly balancing our rations it can be a very good ingredient, especially for the finishing pig.

We used to discourage using canola meal for the younger pigs primarily because of the high fibre content.

However recent research and especially a very nice study that was done very recently in Alberta showed that even with the very young growing pigs 15 percent inclusion of canola meal was very well tolerated.

Dr Beaulieu says the fact that canola meal is higher in fibre and lower in energy will have to be accounted for, either by slightly increasing the oil content in the ration or including more high energy ingredients such as wheat and the amino acids also have to be balanced.

She says canola meal is a good source of methionine but producers may find they'll have to provide slightly more lysine when adding canola meal to rations.