Effects of supplementing growing-finishing pig diets with Bacillus spp. probiotic on growth performance and meat-carcass grade quality traits

Using antibiotics as growth promoters in animal feeds has been forbidden since 2011 in South Korea. Probiotic have received considerable attention as suitable alternatives of antibiotics to promote growth in the pig industry. Among several bacterial species used as probiotic, spore forming Bacillus spp. has been considered as the most appropriate probiotic as its spores can to resist harsh environments, thus enabling extensive storage at ambient temperature. However, reports on feeding a combination of Bacillus spp. probiotic to growing-finishing pigs are rare.

A total of 75 pigs [(Landrace×Yorkshire)×Duroc] with an initial body weight (BW) of 23.3±1.40 kg were used to investigate the influence of dietary Bacillus spp. probiotic (B. coagulance (1x10⁹ cfu/g), B. lichenformis (5x10⁸ cfu/g) and B. subtilis (1x10⁹ cfu/g) in growing-finishing pig on performance parameters with a 16 weeks (wk) feeding trial. Pigs were randomly allocated to 3 treatments [T1-CON (Basal diet); T2 (CON+0.01% probiotic); T3 (CON+0.02% probiotic)] according to their sex and BW as 5 replicates/treatments, with 5 pigs/pen. These dietary treatments were given as Phase I (grower, 0-6 weeks) and Phase II (finisher, 6-16 weeks) to analyze the growth performance traits at the start and at weeks 6, 12, and 16 of the experimental period. Orthogonal polynomial contrast was conducted to measure the linear and quadratic effects for increasing the Bacillus spp. probiotic levels on all measurements.

The entire experiment using dietary probiotic revealed significant effects on average daily gain and gain:feed were observed, but no effects on average daily feed intake. The result showed significant effects on digestibility of dry matter (P=0.002), nitrogen (P=0.069), and energy (P=0.099) at wk 16; number of fecal Lactobacillus (P=0.082; 0.041), E. coli (P=0.097; 0.052) and blood glucose (P=0.001; 0.049) at wk 6 and 16. Dietary supplementation with Bacillus spp. probiotic resulted in linear significant effect on sensory evaluation of meat color (P=0.025), drip loss at d 3 (P=0.013), and carcass weight (P=0.034) in pigs. However, no significant effects on blood metabolic profiles, noxious gas emissions in this experiment.

Dietary combination of Bacillus spp. can be used as probiotic for enhancing the growth performances and carcass quality in growing-finishing pigs. Nevertheless, using Bacillus spp. based complex probiotic to improve meat quality has been questioned because the results in pigs have been inconsistent. Further research should be conducted to determine the impact dietary Bacillus spp. probiotic may have on meat quality traits.

Disclosure of Interest: None Declared.