Effects of feeding a blend of grains naturally contaminated with Fusarium mycotoxins on growth and immunological measurements of starter pigs, and the efficacy of a polymeric glucomannan mycotoxin adsorbent1

Abstract

An experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of feeding a blend of grains naturally contaminated with Fusarium mycotoxins on growth and immunological parameters of starter pigs. A polymeric glucomannan mycotoxin adsorbent (GM polymer, Alltech Inc., Nicholasville, KY) was also tested for its efficacy in preventing Fusarium mycotoxicoses. A total of 150 starter pigs (initial weight of 9.3 +/- 1.1 kg) were fed one of five treatment diets (six pens of five pigs per diet) for 21 d. Diets included control, low level of contaminated grains, high level of contaminated grains, high level of contaminated grains + 0.20% GM polymer, and pair-fed control for comparison with pigs receiving the high level of contaminated grains. Feed intake and cumulative weight gain of pigs decreased linearly with the inclusion of contaminated grains in the diet throughout the experiment (P < 0.0001). Weight gains recovered, however, during wk 3 (P > 0.05). There was no difference between the pair-fed group and the pigs fed the diet containing the high level of contaminated grains in terms of weight gain or feed efficiency (P > 0.05). Feeding contaminated grains linearly increased the serum albumin:globulin ratio (P = 0.01), whereas serum urea concentrations and gamma-glutamyltransferase activities responded in a quadratic fashion (P = 0.02). When compared with the pair-fed pigs, serum concentrations of total protein (P = 0.01) and globulin (P = 0.02) were decreased in pigs fed the diet containing the high level of contaminated grains. The feeding of contaminated diets did not significantly alter organ weights expressed as a percentage of BW, serum immunoglobulin concentrations, percentages of peripheral blood lymphocyte subsets, contact hypersensitivity to dinitrochlorobenzene, or primary antibody response to sheep red blood cells (P > 0.05). It was concluded that most of the adverse effects of feeding Fusarium mycotoxin-contaminated grains to starter pigs were caused by reduced feed intake. Although supplementation of GM polymer to the contaminated diet prevented some toxin-induced changes in metabolism, it did not prevent the mycotoxin-induced growth depression under the current experimental conditions.

Evaluation of chronic immune system stimulation models in growing pigs

“…Pigs on MYCO were given a diet containing 5% naturally contaminated wheat. The diet contained a mixture of (mg/kg diet) deoxynivalenol (5.8), fusaric acid (49.3), zearalenone (0.5) and 15-acetyldeoxynivalenol (0.3), as described previously by Swamy et al (2003). Pigs were randomly assigned to the three treatments.…”

Effect of dietary esterified glucomannan on performance, serum biochemistry and haematology in broilers exposed to aflatoxin

“…The studies performed with EG (0.5 and 1 g/kg) at different concentrations of AF (0.05 to 5 mg/kg) in broilers (Raju and Devegowda, 2000;Aravind et al, 2003;Santin et al, 2003) showed that EG partially and/or completely reversed the adverse effect of AF on performance, biochemistryhaematology and immune responses of birds. EG was also used for detoxification of other mycotoxins such as zearalenone (Swamy et al, 2003) and aurofusarin (Dvorska and Surai, 2001).…”

Effects of feeding naturally contaminated diet with zearalenone, fumonisin and deoxynivalenol with or without yeast cell wall adsorbent on growth, vulva size and organ weights of gilts

“…Deoxynivalenol (DON) content was analysed using high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) as presented by Swamy et al (2003). The limits of detection were 0.10 ppm for ZEA and DON and 0.25 ppm for FUM.…”