1. Effect of carbohydrase and protease on growth performance and gut health of young broilers fed diets containing rye, wheat, and feather meal
- Author
-
Frances Yan, Julia J. Dibner, C. D. Knight, and Mercedes Vazquez-Anon
- Subjects
0301 basic medicine ,Male ,Lutein ,Glycoside Hydrolases ,Clostridium perfringens ,medicine.medical_treatment ,Carbohydrase ,medicine.disease_cause ,Feed conversion ratio ,03 medical and health sciences ,chemistry.chemical_compound ,Ileum ,medicine ,Animals ,Food science ,Asymptomatic Infections ,Poultry Diseases ,Triticum ,Protease ,biology ,Feather meal ,Secale ,digestive, oral, and skin physiology ,0402 animal and dairy science ,food and beverages ,04 agricultural and veterinary sciences ,General Medicine ,Feathers ,040201 dairy & animal science ,Animal Feed ,Small intestine ,Enteritis ,Diet ,030104 developmental biology ,medicine.anatomical_structure ,chemistry ,Dietary Supplements ,biology.protein ,Clostridium Infections ,Animal Science and Zoology ,Animal Nutritional Physiological Phenomena ,Digestion ,Chickens ,Peptide Hydrolases - Abstract
An experiment was conducted to characterize a gut health challenge model consisting of a diet containing rye, wheat, and feather meal and a mild mixed-species Eimeria challenge, and to evaluate the effect of carbohydrase and protease on growth performance and gut health of young broilers. The study included 4 treatments: negative control, carbohydrase alone, protease alone, and combination of carbohydrase and protease. Each test diet was fed to 18 battery pens of broilers with 8 male birds per pen from 0 to 22 d of age. Carbohydrase improved body weight, feed intake, and feed conversion ratio (FCR) on d 7, 14, and 21(P < 0.01). Protease increased body weight on d 7 and 21 and improved 0 to 7 d FCR (P < 0.05). More lymphocyte infiltration was observed in small intestine mucosa of negative control birds on d 8, carbohydrase supplementation lessened this. Both carbohydrase and protease reduced digesta viscosity on d 22 with the carbohydrase effect being the greater of the two, and the combination effect was not different from the carbohydrase effect alone (P < 0.01). Ileal Clostridium perfringens of 15-day-old broilers was decreased by carbohydrase, a further reduction was achieved by combining carbohydrase with protease (P = 0.01). Liver vitamin E concentration on d 15 (P < 0.01) and 22 (P = 0.02) was increased by carbohydrase, and the carbohydrase effect was greater in the presence of protease on d 22 (P = 0.04). Plasma α-1-acid glycoprotein level and liver Zn and Cu concentrations of broilers were reduced by carbohydrase on d 15 (P < 0.01). Broilers fed carbohydrase had higher levels of plasma zeaxanthin on d 22 and higher levels of plasma lutein on d 15 and 22 (P < 0.01). In summary, a rye wheat based diet containing feather meal when fed to broilers in addition to a mild Eimeria challenge induced subclinical enteritis characterized by digestion inefficiency, dysbacteriosis, inflammation, and gut barrier failure; carbohydrase and protease could be effective tools to improve growth performance and gut health of broilers suffering from this type of subclinical enteritis.
- Published
- 2016