Poultry water treatments and Salmonella prevalence in broilers - Brian Fairchild

Dear Dr. Fuad, organic acid + inorganic acid (simply, water acidifier) can a little bit decrease pH of water, to prevent Salmonella population. But to remove biofilm, it is necessary to use more stronger acid plus hydrogen peroxide. This is waterpipe cleaning procedure. After these cleaning, necessary to wash pipes by fresh water and than continue to use organic acids. Cleaning is necessary to perform periodically, but if to use water acidifier, you can clean water pipes less often. Please to be careful with concentrated acids and hydrogen peroxide, and don't close pipes because pressure will highly increased during these cleaning.

I would like to come back to the topic of the title, which is related to water treatment and Salmonella prevalence. I think there is not a kind of a golden bullet and a strict biosecurity program including several strategies is key for preventing Salmonella outbreaks on farm level. Organic acids applied over the water and/or feed can be considered as part of such anti-Salmonella programs. Talking about water treatment, formic acid based products are typically used in the market. Advanced drinking water concepts have been developed over the years, however, only very limited organic acids products have been scientifically tested in drinking water against Salmonella in poultry. One exception is a unique blend (Activate WD Max) of organic acids with methionine hydroxy analogue. Previous studies have demonstrated a synergistically effects against Salmonella, when combining the hydroxy analogue with organic acids such as formic acid. Its usage in drinking water has shown a reduction in horizontal transmission of salmonella in poultry flocks by a significant decrease of Salmonella in the cecal content together with a significant lower number of Salmonella-positive litter drag swabs. Typical inclusion rates are 0.5-1ml/liter drinking water.

I can only agree that one tends to overestimate the impact of water acidification in Salmonella control. Sure, it is one part of the concept to combat Salmonella. At least in Europe, the chances of introducing Salmonella into broilers via feed and water are minimal. That doesn't mean that biosecurity measures in those vectors shall be neglected (we are using formic acid based acidifiers in the drinking water of birds till we reach pH 4.5, in order to ensure an inhibition of bacteria growth in the water and pipes itself), but it shows from our point of view the importance of using steps/tools/additives to help the gut of the bird to reach a state of eubiosis. And in this regard, ADDCON has been working with diformates over a number of years (Mr. Onwuka commented on one of those (Formi NDF) in his post) in order to minimize/inhibit Salmonella in poultry. Diformates (in contrast to free formic acid) had been able to demonstrate that they are able to reach the small intestine in relevant amounts (up to 85% of the overall active ingredient). Relevant Salmonella reduction on farm is never a quick-fix, but takes time and potentially several different steps, however, we are sure that the concept of using diformates (in this case sodium diformate) can help to reduce the Salmonella load in broiler, breeder and layer. For that task, we usually recommend a dosage of 3 kg/t.

Dear All!

Nice comments on water acidification. However, none of the participants suggested the final water pH, after acid treatment, that will be effective. Can we discuss a little about the value that we should expect?

Dear all, at first, low pH in watering system is reasonable because it prevents biofilm formation. At second, Salmonella is quite sensitive to low pH (independently on acid type). At third, both sodium diformate and potassium diformate also effective against Salmonella using cell membrane penetration. And finally, very important is to make inconvenient environment for Salmonella: feed enzymes destroying food substrates for Salmonella, probiotics make the same plus producing anti-Salmonella bacteriocins. And proper laboratory control to prevent possible feed bacterial pollution. And don't forget about complete poultry farm disinfection, of course!

It is a common mistake to think about water treatment as something to be done only at the end of production. As Brian says, control needs to begin early on in the flow, and needs to be maintained throughout in order to keep the pressure on the microbes.

We will be presenting some data on feed and water acidification using formic acid at PSA this summer. We found that continuous water acidification did improve cecal Salmonella.