Table 4.

Growth performance of weanling pigs fed the positive control diet (PC), the negative control diet (NC), or diets containing different doses of C. butyricum (CB)^1,2

	Treatment						P-value
Item	PC	NC	NC+ 1,250 cfu	NC + 2,500 cfu	NC + 3,500 cfu	SEM	Linear	Quad3	NC vs. CB	PC vs. CB	PC vs. NC
Days 0 to 14 (phase 1)
Initial weight, kg	6.44	6.42	6.43	6.41	6.44	0.24	0.978	0.972	0.986	0.977	0.969
ADG, g	134	105	120	127	112	10.59	0.479	0.137	0.197	0.217	0.045
ADFI, g	217	193	217	207	204	23.37	0.648	0.210	0.219	0.593	0.163
G:F	0.619	0.538	0.548	0.614	0.551	0.06	0.404	0.306	0.360	0.221	0.086
Final weight, kg	8.21	7.89	8.10	8.19	8.00	0.31	0.721	0.500	0.530	0.739	0.434
Days 14 to 35 (phase 2)
ADG, g	595	554	608	570	562	19.86	0.904	0.027	0.122	0.375	0.049
ADFI, g	910	845	901	865	901	27.38	0.196	0.609	0.093	0.422	0.045
G:F	0.655	0.656	0.674	0.660	0.627	0.01	0.080	0.031	0.865	0.906	0.966
Final weight, kg	20.69	19.50	20.85	20.14	19.79	0.44	0.886	0.051	0.145	0.406	0.064
Days 0 to 35 (overall phase)
ADG, g	408	374	412	393	382	10.92	0.849	0.006	0.040	0.243	0.010
ADFI, g	633	584	628	602	622	15.67	0.213	0.421	0.073	0.403	0.033
G:F	0.646	0.641	0.657	0.653	0.617	0.01	0.133	0.013	0.910	0.780	0.749

¹Each least squares mean represents 11 observations.

² C. butyricum was added to provide 1,250 × 10⁸, 2,500 × 10⁸, or 3,500 × 10⁸ cfu/kg of complete diet.

³Quad, quadratic effect.