Effects of Supplemental Mannanoligosaccharides on Growth Performance, Faecal Characteristics and Health in Dairy Calves

Abstract

Twenty Holstein calves were used to investigate the effects of mannanoligosaccharides (MOS) supplementation in the whole milk on growth performance, faecal score, faecal pH, selected faecal bacterial populations and health during the preweaning period. Healthy calves selected by clinical examination were allocated to one of the two groups (control [CG] and experimental [EG]) at 5 days old. Each group consisted of 5 male and 5 female calves. Each calf in EG was supplemented with 7 g/d of a MOS product (Celmanax) from 5 days to 56 days of age. MOS supplement was mixed with the whole milk once in the morning and administered to the calves in EG via nipple bottle, whereas the calves in CG were fed the whole milk without MOS. Calves were weaned at 56 days of age. The final body weight, average daily weight gain (ADG) and average daily feed intake (ADFI) were statistically similar (p>0.05) but were higher by 3.70%, 6.66%, and 10.97%, respectively, in MOS than in control calves. Feed efficiency (ADG/ADFI) was also similar in two calves group. While faecal scores did not differ on day 5, 7, 14, 21, 28, 42, 49, and 56 between groups, EG had a higher faecal score (p = 0.05) than CG on day 35. Faecal concentration of Lactobacillus was lower (p<0.05) in EG compared with CG. No differences (p>0.05) in faecal concentrations of Bifidobacterium, Clostridium perfringens, and Escherichia coli were found between groups. Although there were no significant differences (p>0.05) in the incidence of diarrhoea, treatment days for diarrhoea and the costs associated with diarrhoea treatments between groups, collectively, the observed reductions in treatment days and the cost of diarrhoea treatments accompanying increases in final body weight, ADG and ADFI for EG may indicate potential benefit of MOS in treatment of diarrhoea.

A Meta-Analysis of the Inclusion of Bio-Mos® in Milk or Milk Replacer Fed to Dairy Calves on Daily Weight Gain in the Pre-Weaning Period

“…Commercial mannan-oligosaccharides vary in composition and purity and thereby efficacy. For example, a study in Turkey supplementing calves daily with 7 g mannan-oligosaccharides (not Bio-Mos ® ) could not detect any improvement in gut health or microbial community, as well as no significant difference in weight gain compared with control calves [11]. Therefore, caution should be taken when extrapolating the results of this meta-analysis to other commercial mannan-oligosaccharides.…”

Effect of prebiotic supplementation with stabilized rice bran in milk of pre-weaned organic Holstein calves

“…Published studies using prebiotics as a prophylactic or treatment therapy in pre-weaned calves are limited and there is not consensus on their effect on health and diarrhea presentation in young dairy calves. Although positive effects were reported in the reduction of disease presentation or diarrhea scores by some authors [6, 7, 11, 13], other studies did not find significant differences [9, 10].…”

“…Published data is not consistent on resulting ADG in calves fed with prebiotics. No differences in ADG has been reported [8, 10, 11]. Conversely, some studies found a greater ADG in pre-weaned calves fed with prebiotic (MOS) in milk for 60 days [6, 12].…”

“…For example, the supplementation of MOS resulted in a reduction in almost 1 point on the severity of neonatal diarrhea in a 1 to 4 scale [6] and decreased the number of days with high diarrhea scores [7]. Contrary, other studies reported no differences in diarrhea cases after the supplementation prebiotics [8–10] in pre-weaned dairy calves. Furthermore, some studies indicated no differences in weight gain [8, 10, 11], while greater gains were reported by others [6, 12, 13] after a prebiotic supplementation in pre-weaned calves.…”

>b<Efeito do tempo de ingestão de diferentes prebióticos nos produtos fermentativos fecais e imunidade de cães adultos>/b<

“…Na indústria de pet food há uma gama de prebióticos que são incluídos nas formulações. Os prebióticos mais frequentemente estudados e incluídos nos alimentos são os frutooligossacarídeos (FOS) e os mananoligossacarídeos (MOS) (GHOSH & MEHLA, 2012;GRAND et al, 2013;KARA et al, 2015). Já com relação ao prebiótico galactooligossacarídeo (GOS) existem poucas informações sobre seu emprego em cães, uma vez que na literatura há apenas dois estudos que incluíram este aditivo em alimentos para estes animais (ZENTEK et al, 2002;RENTAS, 2018).…”