It is difficult to study direct causes of childhood obesity due to varied diets and genetics of human children. In the present study, we used piglets as a model to determine the effect of milk on adipose tissue. We hypothesized that milk consumption would not affect production of adipose tissue. Two studies were conducted using 5-wk-old male Yorkshire piglets (n = 8) for a pilot study and 8- to 9-wk-old male Berkshire-Duroc crosses (n = 12) in the main study. The piglets were all fed a normal growing diet and randomly assigned to get daily 750 mL of whole cow milk or an isocaloric maltodextrin solution. For 11 wk, body weight, feed intake, and subcutaneous back fat thickness determined ultrasonographically were recorded. At euthanasia, back and neck fat thicknesses were measured and samples of back fat were collected for adipose histology. All data were analyzed using R with a linear mixed effect model with treatment as main effect for histology data and all back fat data and with additional interaction of time and treatment for the weight gain, feed conversion ratio (FCR), average daily intake (ADI), average daily gain (ADG), and ultrasonography data. Pig was used as random variable. In the pilot study there were significant (P < 0.002) time and treatment interactions for FCR, ADI, weekly weight gain, and overall food intake. In all instances but FCR, the piglets fed with milk had a larger value at the end of the study. In the main study, there was a trend toward control piglets eating more (P = 0.07) but having less ADG (P = 0.08) as the study progressed. There were no differences in ultrasound back fat thickness for either study, but in the pilot study both back fat and neck fat thickness were larger in the milk-fed piglets (P < 0.05). In the pilot study the milk-fed piglets had higher frequency of small adipocytes (P = 0.09) and lower frequency of intermediate and large adipocytes compared with control (P < 0.05). In the main study, the control pigs had significant greater (P < 0.05) frequency of intermediate adipocytes but the milk-fed piglets tended to have higher frequency of the largest adipocytes (P = 0.06). Based on the data from both studies, we conclude that milk has no apparent causal effect on amount of adipose tissue in growing individuals.