The effects of feeding the direct-fed microbial, primalac, on growth parameters and egg production in single comb white leghorn hens

Abstract

Two commercial strains of Single Comb White Leghorn hens, HyLine W-36 and DeKalb XL, were reared separately as pullet flocks in an enclosed, environmentally controlled brood-grow house with three banks of quad-deck cages (310 cm2 per bird). There were 1,800 hens of each strain, which were divided into two groups, control feed and a direct-fed microbial (DFM) feed treatment. During the pullet-rearing phase to 18 wk of age, the DeKalb birds had greater parameters of growth and overall feed cost than the HyLine birds. The overall feed cost of the DFM treatment was $0.02 per bird greater than controls. However, the DFM-treated feed improved the livability of the DeKalb birds by 2.68%. At 18 wk of age, 3,528 hens were transferred to an enclosed, mechanically ventilated layer house. The two strains were placed in two differently sized quad-deck layer cages with seven birds per cage; the cage sizes were 35.56 cm x 60.96 cm (2,267.73 cm2 or 310 cm2 per bird) and 14 cm x 32 cm (2,890.32 cm2 or 413 cm2 per bird). There were a total of 144 replications with each strain and DFM treatment combination made up of 36 replications equally divided between the high and low density cages. At 70 wk of age, hens receiving the DFM treatment exhibited greater mean egg weights (61.72 g) and percentages of extra large eggs (XLE, 52.06%) compared to that of controls (61.12 g and 48.98%, respectively). The treatment of 310 cm2/hen DFM produced the least (P < or = 0.05) large eggs; however, this treatment group produced the most (P < or = 0.05) XLE. The use of DFM resulted in a shift from smaller to larger eggs. Regardless of density, the DFM hens had lower (P < or = 0.05) feed cost (FC) compared to FC of the controls (a savings of $0.46/bird between the DFM and control in the 310 cm2 /hen treatment and a $0.83 savings/bird between the DFM and control in the 413 cm2/hen treatment). It was concluded that PrimaLac can improve egg size and lower feed costs, regardless of the bird density used in the present study.

Effects of Kluyveromyces marxianus Isolated from Tibetan Mushrooms on the Plasma Lipids, Egg Cholesterol Level, Egg Quality and Intestinal Health of Laying Hens

“…Similar studies reported a significant improvement of egg production in hens fed a mixed culture of probiotics, such as Lactobacillus acidophilus and Lactobacillus casei (Tortuero & Fernandez, 1995), L. acidophilus alone , Pediococcus acidilactici (Mikulski et al, 2012), Bacillus subtilis (Xu et al 2006;Abdelqader et al 2013), Propionibacterium jensenii (Luo et al, 2010), and Saccharomyces cerevisiae (Yalçin et al, 2010). Significant improvements in egg weight and eggshell quality were also obtained in hens fed diets supplemented with a mixture of Lactobacillus cultures (Davis & Anderson, 2002;Kalavathy et al, 2009).…”

“…In recent years, there has been an increasing number of reports documenting the use of various yeast strains and yeast products, such as inactive dried yeast, yeast culture, whey yeast, selenium yeast, chromium yeast and yeast cell walls, in the diets of laying hens. The inclusion of yeast in layer diets was shown to change egg production (Davis & Anderson, 2002), cholesterol content of the egg yolk (Yousefi & Karkoodi, 2007;Yalçin et al, 2008a), intestinal health of the hens (Yalçin et al, 2010;Lensing et al, 2012), egg quality (Utterback et al, 2005;Yalçin et al, 2008a, b;Yalçin et al, 2009;Yalçin et al, 2010), and egg fat content (Savage et al, 1985;Hosseini, 2011), among others.…”

Effects of a multi-strain probiotic (PrimaLac) on performance and antibody responses to Newcastle disease virus and infectious bursal disease virus vaccination in broiler chickens

“…Recently, the beneficial effect of PrimaLac (Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus casei, Enterococcus faecium and Bifidobacterium bifidium) on growth parameters and egg production of laying hens was reported (Davis & Anderson, 2002), and the present study was designed to evaluate the effects of PrimaLac on performance (feed intake, FCR, mortality rate) of broiler chickens and on their antibody responses to routine vaccination with live NDV and infectious bursal disease virus vaccines.…”

The Beneficial Role of Probiotics in Monogastric Animal Nutrition and Health

“…A combined mix culture of Lactobacillus acidophilus, L. Casei, Bifidobacterium thermophilus and Enterococcus faecium enhanced egg size and lowered feed cost in laying hens. 238 Moreover, Bifidobacterium thermophilus and Enterococcus faecium improved egg production and quality. 239 The use of Enterococci as probiotics is somewhat controversial in humans, but in chickens prolonged feeding with E. Faecium based probiotics increased egg laying intensity and feed conversion efficiency.…”