Dietary grape pomace – effects on growth performance, intestinal health, blood parameters, and breast muscle myopathies of broiler chickens

Abstract

The search for alternatives to antibiotics in poultry production is still on-going and has been directed towards investigation of the efficacy of different potential alternatives. However, it is important that the sought alternatives are cost-efficient and have no negative impact on meat quality, for ease of adoption and profit maximization. This study aimed at exploiting an agro-industrial waste, grape pomace ( GP ) as an alternative to in-feed antibiotics and assessing the effects on growth, intestinal morphology, ceca microbiota, ceca short-chain fatty acid ( SCFA ) concentration, blood biochemical parameters, and breast muscle myopathies of broiler chickens. A total of 576 one-day-old Cobb-500 broiler chicks were randomly allotted to 3 dietary treatments – Negative control ( NC , a corn-wheat soybean-based diet), NC + 0.05% bacitracin methylene disalicylate ( BMD ), and NC + 2.5% GP. Each treatment was assigned to 8 replicate pens with 25 birds per pen. Body weight ( BW ), feed intake ( FI ), and feed conversion ratio ( FCR ) were determined weekly. On d 36, 2 chickens/pen were euthanized for measuring blood biochemical parameters, ceca SCFA, and ceca microbiota. White striping ( WS ) and wooden breast ( WB ) incidence were assessed in 4 chickens/pen on d 42. The GP diet increased ( P < 0.05) average FI throughout the feeding phases compared to the other treatments, but overall FCR was similar. Birds in the GP treatment had higher ( P < 0.05) villus height ( VH ) and increased VH:crypt depth ratio in the duodenum and jejunum compared to other treatments. The level of ceca SCFA and the incidence of WS and WB was the same for all treatments. Plasma Ca and P were significantly higher ( P < 0.05) in birds fed GP and BMD, compared to the NC. Birds in the GP treatment had significantly reduced ( P < 0.05) plasma aspartate transaminase than other treatments. Birds receiving GP had a higher ( P < 0.05) relative abundance of the phylum Bacteroidetes and reduced ( P < 0.05) Firmicutes compared to other treatments. The relative abundance of Bacteroides and Lactobacillus genera were higher ( P < 0.05) among birds fed GP compared to other treatments. Inclusion of 2.5% GP in broiler chicken diets improved gut morphology and modified the cecal bacterial community and blood biochemical profiles with no adverse effect on growth performance and meat quality.

Effect of red osier dogwood extract on growth performance, blood biochemical parameters, and gut functionality of broiler chickens challenged or unchallenged intraperitoneally with Salmonella Enteritidis lipopolysaccharide

“…With or without the SE -LPS challenge, 0.3 and 0.5% ROD extract conferred a more beneficial effect by significantly increasing the abundance of genera Lactobacillus and Streptococcus compared to the antibiotic treatment. In contrast to antibiotic use, plant materials rich in polyphenols have been consistently shown to increase the population of gut-friendly Lactobacillus spp (Giannenas et al., 2018 ; Abolfathi et al., 2019 ; Erinle et al., 2022) . Crisol-Martínez et al.…”

“…This is not unexpected as the number of total eubacteria was not altered by the dietary treatments and SE -LPS challenge. Erinle et al. (2022) speculated that uniform copies of total eubacteria in cecal content of birds often give rise to unaltered cecal SCFA concentrations.…”

Food Industry Byproducts as Starting Material for Innovative, Green Feed Formulation: A Sustainable Alternative for Poultry Feeding

“…In a recent work, dietary incorporation of grape pomace at the inclusion level of 2.5% as alternative to in-feed antibiotics was shown to exert beneficial effects on the growth performances of broiler chickens during the starter phase (days 1–14); from days 14 to 28, the diets showed slightly negative effects on growth performances. No differences in feed efficiency were found throughout the overall period [ 48 ]. GP inclusion improved the villus height and villus height crypt depth ratio and the modulation of gut microbiota, while the ceca short-chain fatty acid concentrations were not affected in birds fed grape pomace.…”

“…GP inclusion improved the villus height and villus height crypt depth ratio and the modulation of gut microbiota, while the ceca short-chain fatty acid concentrations were not affected in birds fed grape pomace. Therefore, the inclusion of grape pomace at 2.5% in the diet of broiler chickens was favorable for the optimization of intestinal health without affecting their blood biochemical and immune profiles [ 48 ]. The impacts of GP, as reported in the literature, depended on its inclusion level in chickens’ diets; Goñi et al, and Sáyago-Ayerdi et al, reported that addition of dietary GP up to 6% did not impair growth performance.…”

White Grape Pomace Valorization for Remediating Purposes

“…These can be further purified and valorized. Their second property refers to the capacity of promoting the hydrolysis of the pomace cellular walls for a more accessible release of the nutrients [37], as well as for obtaining eutectic solvents [38] or using as a source of natural antibiotics for the poultry industry [39]. The considered methods have the primary objective of developing sustainable analytic methods and reducing the impact on the ecosystems throughout the circular economy concept.…”