The experiment was designed to study the phosphorus (P) flow between the physiologic or anatomical compartments of horses and to evaluate the P absorption and availability in horse diets. The experimental treatments were constituted by different sources of phosphate: "Tapira", "Patos de Minas", dicalcium and bone flour. The model, deterministic and compartmental, was adapted from Aubert and Milhaud model, in which the digestive tract and the bone and soft tissues represented the compartments in bi-directional flow with the blood. The informations on metabolism and kinetic of P in tissues obtained by the isotopic dilution technique were used. It was concluded that: the fecal and urinary P and the bi-directional flow from soft tissues and bone to blood are not influenced by the kind of phosphorus sources, when the "Tapira", "Patos de Minas" and dicalcium phosphate or bone meal are added to the horse diets; the P flow from gut to blood depends on the kind of phosphate used in the diets, being the values largest observed in the dicalcium phosphate, "Patos de Minas" phosphate and bone meal; the P absorption and availability of the phosphate "Patos de Minas" and meal bones in horses diets are similar to the one of the dicalcium phosphate, constituting those phosphates in alternative sources for supplemental dietary P in horses.
foals; model; phosphate; radio-phosphorus
