Promoting Gut Health in Piglets

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Leeché Storm: Technical Advisor, AFGRI Animal Feeds

Gut health in pigs has become a vocal point in the swine industry in recent years. Intestinal health has become a priority since it allows to improve performance, reduce production costs and achieve a high level of animal welfare. Globally the use of antibiotics is being discouraged, but with piglets going through the weaning process, antibiotics has been a helping hand through the transition from the lactation phase to the weaner phase. The goal is to avoid using antibiotics and for that a healthy gut is needed to adapt to the stress of weaning.

The formulation of the diet is key in maintaining a healthy gut, but also the practical management of the feed post weaning improves the nutrients available for growth and immune function. Encouraging increased and continuous feed intake is essential in lowering the risk of disease and improved performance. Each of these factors are important for optimized feed intake:

– Adequate feeder space and feed availability

– Adjustment of feeders according to size and eating habits of the pigs

– Always remove stale or spoiled feed

– Proper maintenance and adjustment of water nipples

 

With feed contributing to around 70% of production costs, nutrition is the most important driver in pig production. A good feeding program not only meets the nutritional requirements of the pigs in each phase of their life, but also promotes a healthy intestine. The intestine protects the pig through maintenance of the microflora in the gut and aids in the release of antibodies to fight against pathogens. Tissues in the gastrointestinal tract makes up a large portion of the immune system of the pig, supporting these tissues with the required nutrients contributes to a stronger immune system and a better feed conversion ratio. A healthy, well-developed piglet has better growth potential than a struggling piglet. When improving the gut health of a piglet pre-weaning, it will be less likely to experience the challenges of weaning and a changing diet.

 

The change of diet in the early phases of a piglet’s life can alter the gut microflora and cause stress on the animal, this leads to a weakened immune system prone to diseases. Bad bacteria can multiply and cause infections, leading to a reduction in the piglets’ digestive and absorption capacity. This is highly prevalent when the piglet is weaned from milk to solid food as well as being moved to the weaner house where the pigs are grouped together. Loss of body mass can be seen where the energy and nutrients to be used for growth is now used to fight disease, resulting in a poor feed conversion to body mass and ultimately an economic loss.

In commercial pig production it is important to analyze the cost to benefit ratio of the implementation of a gut health program in the feeding regime. Supplementation of direct-fed microbial products in the feed to improve intestinal health has been shown to maintain a healthy gut and as a result reducing the need for antibiotics. Improved gut health has also been proven to reduce the incidence of diarrhea and lower mortality rate. Direct-fed microbial products can be added to the diets or water supply to aid in the building of healthy gut microflora.

Gut health is not just the effective digestion and absorption of feed, but also the absence of disease. A healthy piglet is enabled to sustainably perform to its full genetic potential by growing through the phases until slaughter at the desired weight. With a healthy gut, more pigs will enter the grower phase at a better weight, thus being more profitable.

By-products in pig diets with high levels of non-starch polysaccharides and how to overcome this anti-nutritional factor.

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By Leeché Storm (Technical Advisor, Pigs)

The demand for cereal and oil seeds from emerging markets for energy production has placed increased pressure on the global animal feed sector with the rise of raw material costs. To lower feed costs and improve the sustainable use of feed resources for animal production, by-products from the food and bio-fuel industries are increasingly used as feed additives. The main by-product of the dry-grind manufacture of bio-ethanol from cereal grains is distillers’ dried grains containing solubles (DDGS). DDGS is the dried residue remaining after the starch fraction of maize is fermented with yeasts to produce ethanol. Following fermentation, the ethanol is removed by distillation and the remaining fermentation residues are dried. Since DDGS is rich in crude protein, fat, fibre, vitamins, and minerals, it is currently used in aquaculture and livestock feeds. In recent years, DDGS has been used as feedstock in the production of value-added products via microbial fermentation.

This raw material is just one example of many by-products that can be used in livestock feed formulation to lessen the cost of the diet. A limitation in the use of these by-products in animal feed is their high levels of plant cell wall material, primarily non-starch polysaccharides (NSPs), which cannot be broken down by mammalian enzymes. The structural makeup of NSPs frequently prevents them from being degraded by microbial enzymes. Additionally, NSP can bind with other essential nutrients and disrupt digestive processes, decreasing their digestibility and absorption. Pigs are monogastric animals, and since they lack endogenous enzymes that can break down dietary NSPs their ability to absorb nutrients is decreased as a result.

Exogenous enzymes are therefore used to increase pig growth performance through dietary approaches when high-value NSP raw materials are included in the diet composition. These exogenous enzymes include phytase, protease and xylanase:

  • Phytase: Phytic acid, an anti-nutritional compound that can bind to minerals including phosphorus and decrease their availability to pigs, is broken down by phytase enzymes. Adding phytase enzymes to pig diets with a high NSP value can enhance growth performance and lessen environmental pollution. Phytase reduces phosphorus excretion in growing pigs as well as improves nutrient digestibility in pigs. DDGS for example can be used in grower pig diets to substitute some of the maize and soybean meal in the formula without having any negative effects on the pigs’ carcass characteristics or meat quality.
  • Protease: Protease enzymes break down large protein molecules into smaller peptides and amino acids, enhancing pigs’ ability to utilize nitrogen and consequently reduce the nitrogen content in their manure. Protease supplementation helps weaned pigs digest protein better and maintain gut health. Adding protease to a high NSP value diet will improve the digestibility of crude protein and amino acids.
  • Xylanase: Xylanase can lessen the viscosity of digesta in young pigs, reducing diarrhoea incidences. Supplementing high NSP-level pig diets with xylanase can enhance nutrient absorption, boost growth performance and lower feed cost. When exogenous multi-enzyme components including xylanase are added to a diet, reduced gut inflammation in finishing pigs can be observed meaning that the pigs are expending less energy on immune support and more on growth.

These additives can be included in small quantities and make a substantial difference in the commercial pig production industry. Saving costs anywhere we can is crucial in a sustainable future for pig producers in South Africa.