The influence of the amount and nature of dietary fat on milk fat composition in the sow

Abstract

1. The effects of the introduction into the diet of natural fats rich in individual fatty acids or of simple triglycerides on the composition of blood lipids and of milk fat in the sow were investigated.2. Replacement in the diet of a mixture of animal, vegetable and marine oils by a single natural fat had varying effects on the concentrations of plasma lipid fractions, whereas replacement of tallow by simple triglycerides, with few exceptions, increased the concentrations of all fractions.3. When butyric or caprylic acids were present in the diet there was no detectable transfer of those acids to plasma triglycerides, and there was only a limited transfer of dietary erucic acid. An increase in the dietary concentration of other acids (ranging from capric to linolenic) was associated with an increase in the content of the acids in the plasma triglycerides. For saturated fatty acids the response to dietary changes was at a maximum for myristic acid.4. The effects on the composition of milk fat reflected the changes in the composition of the plasma triglycerides, except during the feeding of cottonseed oil when there were marked decreases in milk fat of palmitoleic and oleic acids and corresponding increases in palmitic and stearic acids which were not observed in the plasma triglycerides. Also, during the feeding of coconut oil, capric acid was present in the plasma triglycerides but not in milk fat, and the increases in the plasma triglycerides of lauric and myristic acids were much more marked than the corresponding increases in milk fat.