Objective: To effectively utilize crop by-product resources to address the shortage of animal feed during the dry season in Africa, the community of natural lactic acid bacteria (LAB) of corn stover and sugarcane tops and fermentation characteristics of silage were studied in Mozambique.Methods: Corn stover and sugarcane tops were obtained from agricultural field in Mozambique. Silage was prepared with LAB inoculant and cellulase enzyme and their fermentation quality and microbial population were analyzed.Results: Aerobic bacteria were the dominant population with 10⁷ colony-forming unit/g of fresh matter in both crops prior to ensiling, while 10⁴ to 10⁷ LAB became the dominant bacteria during ensiling. <i>Lactobacillus plantarum</i> was more than 76.30% of total isolates which dominated silage fermentation in the LAB-treated sugarcane top silages or all corn stover silages. Fresh corn stover and sugarcane tops contain 65.05% to 76.10% neutral detergent fiber (NDF) and 6.52% to 6.77% crude protein (CP) on a dry matter basis, and these nutrients did not change greatly during ensiling. Corn stover exhibits higher LAB counts and watersoluble carbohydrates content than sugarcane top, which are naturally suited for ensiling. Meanwhile, sugarcane tops require LAB or cellulase additives for high quality of silage making.Conclusion: This study confirms that both crop by-products contain certain nutrients of CP and NDF that could be well-preserved in silage, and that they are potential roughage resources that could cover livestock feed shortages during the dry season in Africa.

The cultivation and application of Pseuderanthemum palatiferum, a plant found in the latter half of the 1990's in northern Vietnam, was studied at a total of 12,829 households located in the city center and suburb of Cantho city. The frequency of the households cultivating the plant, the plant's population and age, recipients, purposes and amount of the dosages were surveyed in interviews with households. Second, growth of the plant at an experimental farm of Cantho University was observed. Only 1.1% of the total households cultivated the plant. However, more (p<0.01) households in the city center cultivated the plant than those in the suburb. More households in the city center cultivated greater populations of the plant. The city center households dosed the plant not only for treatment of human diseases, but also for the prevention and treatment of animal diseases. The frequencies of the dosage and the amount of each dose were more for treatment than for prevention, and more for human diseases than animal diseases. The dosages were more in the city center households. The results of the field study would suggest that cultivation of the plant had been spread from the city center to the suburb, and its dosage had widened from the purpose of treatment to prevention of diseases, and the recipients from human to animal diseases. The plant observed could grow very fast and bloom, in the same way as the growth in northern Vietnam. The easiness of its planting and the earliness of growth would have helped the spread of its cultivation and application in the Mekong Delta region.

To facilitate the use of woody plant (WP) as a natural biomass resource to address the shortage of feed for ruminants in the tropics, we use PacBio SMRT sequencing to explore the microbial co-occurrence network and silage fermentation of gliricidia and leucaena prepared with Napier grass (NG) and corn stover (CS) in Southern Africa. Based on dry matter, the crude protein contents of WP are as high as 25%. Compared with NG, the addition of CS speed up the dynamic succession of microorganisms in the silage fermentation process from Gram-negative bacteria to Gram-positive bacteria, and promoted Lactiplantibacillus plantarum to become the dominant community and enhanced the metabolic pathways of lactic acid and citric acid, thus improved the fermentation flavour and quality of WP silage. WP can be mixed with CS to make high-quality silage, which can alleviate the shortage of feed and promote local animal production.

Attachment of lactic acid bacteria to the mucosal surface of the gastrointestinal tract is a major property of probiotics. Here, we examined the ability of 21 lactic acid bacterial strains isolated from traditional fermented milk products in Mongolia to adhere to porcine gastric mucin in vitro. Higher attachment was observed with Lactobacillus delbrueckii subsp. bulgaricus strains 6-8 and 8-1 than with Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG (positive control). Lactococcus lactis subsp. cremoris strain 7-1 adhered to mucin as effectively as did strain GG. Heat inactivation decreased the adhesive ability of strains 6-8 and 8-1 but did not affect strain 7-1. The adhesion of strains 6-8, 7-1 and 8-1 was significantly inhibited when the cells were pretreated with periodate and trypsin, indicating that proteinaceous and carbohydrate-like cell surface compounds are involved in the adhesion of these strains. The adhesion of strain 7-1 was affected by the type of carbohydrate present in the growth medium, being higher with fructose than with lactose, galactose or xylose as the carbon source. The sugar content of 7-1 cells grown on various carbohydrates was negatively correlated with its adhesive ability. We provide new probiotic candidate strains and new information regarding carbohydrate preference that influences lactic acid bacterial adhesion to mucin.

It has recently been reported that the rare sugar d-allulose has beneficial effects, including the suppression of postprandial blood glucose elevation in humans, and can be substituted for sucrose as a low-calorie food ingredient. To examine the applications of d-allulose in the dairy industry, we investigated the effects of d-allulose on the acid production of 8 strains of yogurt starter (Lactobacillus delbrueckii ssp. bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophilus) and 4 strains of lactococci, including potential probiotic candidates derived from dairy products. Acid production by 2 L. delbrueckii ssp. bulgaricus yogurt starter strains in milk was suppressed by d-allulose, but this phenomenon was also observed in some strains with another sugar (xylose), a sugar alcohol (sorbitol), or both. In contrast, among the dairy probiotic candidates, Lactococcus lactis H61, which has beneficial effects for human skin when drunk as part of fermented milk, was the only strain that showed suppression of acid production in the presence of d-allulose. Strain H61 did not metabolize d-allulose. We did not observe suppression of acid production by strain H61 with the addition of xylose or sorbitol, and xylose and sorbitol were not metabolized by strain H61. The acid production of strain H61 after culture in a constituted medium (tryptone-yeast extract-glucose broth) was also suppressed with the addition of d-allulose, but growth efficiency and sugar fermentation style were not altered. Probiotic activities-such as the angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitory activity of H61-fermented milk and the superoxide dismutase activity of H61 cells grown in tryptone-yeast extract-glucose broth-were not affected by d-allulose. d-Allulose may suppress acid production in certain lactic acid bacteria without altering their probiotic activity. It may be useful for developing new probiotic dairy products from probiotic strains such as Lactococcus lactis H61.

Objective: To measure whether a microbial additive could effectively improve the fermentation quality of delayed-sealing (DS) silage, we studied the effects of inoculants of lactic acid bacteria (LAB) and cellulase enzyme on microbial populations, ensiling characteristics, and spoilage loss of DS silage of Napier grass in Africa.Methods: Quick-sealing (QS) and DS silages were prepared with and without LAB (Lactobacillus plantarum) inoculant, cellulase enzymes, and their combination. The QS material was directly chopped and packed into a bunker silo. The DS material was packed into the silo with a delay of 24 h from harvest.Results: In the QS silage, LAB was dominant in the microbial population and produced large amounts of lactic acid. When the silage was treated with LAB and cellulase, the fermentation quality was improved. In the DS silage, aerobic bacteria and yeasts were the dominant microbes and all the silages were of poor quality. The yeast and mold counts in the DS silage were high, and they increased rapidly during aerobic exposure. As a result, the DS silages spoiled faster than the QS silages upon aerobic exposure.Conclusion: DS results in poor silage fermentation and aerobic deterioration. The microbial additive improved QS silage fermentation but was not effective for DS silage.

An on-farm trial was carried out to improve the current low-income farmers' diet and to assess farm conditions that could accept the new ingredients using locally available feed resources in the Mekong Delta region. A total of 42 local Large White-type pigs, comprising 20 barrows and 22 gilts with initial-to-final mean live weight of 34.2-93.0 kg, were used. The trial was designed as a 3 × 3 factorial with three agricultural gross income levels of seven farm households and three dietary treatments. The annual income levels were high income (HI; $US2355 on average), medium income (MI; $US1439) and low income (LI; $US1116). The three types of diets were farmers' common diet (FCD), rice-based diet (RBD) and waterhyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes)-supplemented diet (WHD). A total of 12 pigs, consisting of two barrow-gilt couples in each diet treatment, were slaughtered at the end of the trial. The daily weight gain (DG) was higher and the feed conversion ratio (FCR) was lower in the MI and LI pigs than in the HI pigs over the entire fattening period (P < 0.01). No significant effect of the diet treatments was observed on the aforementioned two parameters, but the backfat thickness was least in WHD (16.8 mm) and next least in RBD (17.1 mm), compared with that of FCD pigs (19.4 mm; P < 0.05). The iodine values of RBD and WHD backfat were lower (P < 0.001) than those of FCD backfat. The cost performance, defined as feed cost per kg weight gain, was lowest for MI, intermediate for LI and highest for HI levels (P < 0.05). Therefore, the benefit was highest at the MI level and lowest at the HI level (P < 0.05). In contrast, cost performance of the diet treatments tended to be higher in FCD, and lower in RBD and WHD (P < 0.1). Then, the benefit tended to be higher in RBD and WHD than in the FCD diet (P < 0.1). Overall, these results suggest that the RBD and WHD diets be recommended especially to households with medium and low agricultural incomes.Key words: broken rice, carcass quality, farming systems, feed conversion ratio, green feed, rice bran.ally use a high proportion of rice bran (approx. 70%), a lower proportion of broken rice (20%), some commercial protein concentrate feed (concentrate feed), and a small amount of feed from wild plants and/or RICE BY-PRODUCTS OR WATER HYACINTH IN PIG DIET 321

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