Dietary supplementation of late pregnancy diet with yeast derivatives can influence the colostrum yield, colostrum composition and gut performances of sow

Yeast derivatives (YD) are widely used in animal nutrition as natural additives. YD contain glucomannoproteins, betaglucans and nucleotides complex derived by acid hydrolysis of the cell wall of yeasts Saccharomyces cerevisiae. YD can bind and inhibit pathogen bacteria like Salmonella Spp, Clostridium Spp and E. Coli, therefore promoting growth of beneficial gut bacteria. YD have been also associated with positive immunostimulation at gut level in different species. The aim of this study was to examine whether YD based on brewery yeast hydrolysate added to a late pregnancy diet affected colostrum composition, yield (CY) and gut microbiota in sows.

37 sows were randomly allocated to two groups as follows: control (n= 19) and the same diet supplemented with 2 g YD/kg (n=18) during the last 3 weeks of pregnancy. The YD used was Progut® (Hankkija Oy/Suomen Rehu, Hyvinkää, Finland). Within the first 2 hours from the beginning of farrowing, a 10 ml colostrum sample was obtained to check for protein, fat, lactose, dry matter, with FTIR- spectroscopy, IgA, IgM and IgG with ELISA. All piglets were individually weighed at birth and 24 hours later in order to calculate CY. Fecal samples were collected from sow at the beginning of farrowing and were analyzed by 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis.

YD fed sows had higher level of fat in colostrum (5.1% vs 4.2%; p < 0.05; Fig. 1). Colostrum yield was 3701 g in the control group and 4580 g in the YD fed group (p < 0.05; Fig. 3). Gut abundance of Roseburia, Paraprevotella, Eubacterium (a group of butyrate-producing bacteria) were significantly increased in YD supplemented sows. On the other hand, feeding sow YD significantly reduces the abundance of opportunistic pathogens bacteria like Proteobacteria especially Desulfovibrio, Escherichia/Shigella and Helicobacter.

 

 

 

Supplementing YD to late pregnancy diet is contributed to higher fat content and increased the CY. The treatment group was characterized with more butyrate-producing bacteria, while less opportunistic pathogens. Therefore YD added to sow diet in late pregnancy, may increase colostrum availability and also its energy content through fat increment for neonate piglets.