Abstract: This study was conducted to explore the possibility of the herb residues (HR) supplementation in sow diets.Sixty healthy crossbred sows with close expected date of delivery during the 2-4 parities were used and randomly allocated to one of three groups,representing the control group,HR group and fermented HR group,to determine the effects of the HR and fermented HR on reproductive performance of sows and growth performance of their offspring.The results showed that,compared with the control group,the litter size,alive litter size,and average daily gain of weaned piglets from the FHR group displayed a trend toward increasing;the litter weight gain of weaned piglets and diarrhea rate of suckling piglets significantly increased;the backfat loss of sows displayed a trend toward decreasing.The mummy size from the HR group displayed a trend toward increasing,and the diarrhea rate of piglets significantly increased compared with the control group.These findings suggested that dietary supplementation with the fermented HR results in a certain degree of diarrhea of suckling piglets,but improved the reproductive performance in sows and growth performance of piglets.

Key words: pregnant sows, reproductive performance, suckling piglets, growth performance, fermented herb residues