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Praca oryginalna Original paper
Race horse breeders pay particular attention to new born foals overall health and growth to optimize the chances of producing top performers (5). Digestive health, well balanced growth, bone structure, energy and precocity are carefully observed to optimize the chances of producing a highly performing race horse. Diarrhea and digestive disorders often occur during the first weeks of a foals life. Most foals have at least one episode of diarrhea before reaching the age of six months (9). Infectious diarrheas (viral or bacterial) can lead to health problems demanding serious attention and medicine treatment. Diarrhea in horses is associated with their high mortality (2). Many infectious agents have been indicated as causes of diarrhea in horses, including Clostridium sp., Salmonella sp., Escherichia coli, Lawssonia intracellularis and rotavirus (9-11). Diarrhea may also be the result of non-infectious causes, including carbohydrate overloading, colitis, anti--inflammatory toxicity, sand irritation, feed changes in mature horses (4) and gastro duodendal ulceration in foals (12).
Preventing diarrhea episodes and reduction of diar-rhea severity help to secure a good start for a young race horse.
Probiotics are considered as feed additives in the diet of numerous animals including horses (13, 18, 21). The horses digestive tract does not normally need the help of added probiotics, but it may benefit from pro-biotics under certain critical circumstances (22). Then probiotics supplementation should only be performed with a clearly defined purpose and over a limited time. The use of probiotics in horses is a relevant factor in preventing digestive disorders, enhancing microbial fermentation in the large intestine and in respect of systemic effects such as the immune function (22). The administration of a probiotic to hospitalized horses appeared to reduce the incidence of Salmonella shedding after 48 h of hospitalization by 65% (17). Weight gain and improvement in feed conversion were observed in Arabian Egyptian foals when their diet was enriched with Lactobacillus sp. (1).
Dietary yeast supplementation of Thoroughbred mares during late gestation and early lactation resulted in greater contents of crude protein, sugar, total lipids and proteins in milk and better performance of their suckling foals (7). Probiotics composed of live lactic acid bacteria and yeast improved the digestibility of Mangalarga Marchador foals diet (14, 15). The
admi-Effect of VivaFlor Optimax feed supplement
in mares diet on diarrhea of new born foals
CLAUDETTE BERGER, PIOTR KO£AKOWSKI*, JAROS£AW KSIʯUK**Danisco, 20 rue de Brunel, 75 000 Paris, France *Danisco Biolacta, 1A Tuwima Str., 10-747 Olsztyn, Poland **Horse Stable Krasne, 36 Mickiewicza Str., 06-408 Krasne, Poland
Berger C., Ko³akowski P., Ksiê¿uk J.
Effect of VivaFlor Optimax feed supplement in mares diet on diarrhea of new born foals
Summary
For breeders of racing horses, preventing diarrhea episodes and reduction of diarrhea severity in foals is still a big challenge in the production of top performers. The objective of the study was to assess the effect of heat treated L. farciminis, L. rhamnosus, L. plantarum and Propionibacterium sp. (VivaFlor Optimax) in Thoroughbred mares diet during late gestation and early lactation on foals diarrhea episodes and severity. Fourteen mares randomly chosen out of 27 mares were placed on a diet supplemented with VivaFlor Optimax in the course of 3 months at 5 g, containing at least 1 × 109 of dead microbial cells/g of formulation, every
evening. The remaining 13 (out of 27) mares made up the control group. The number of diarrhea days, the medicine treatment, appearance and behavior of the foals were recorded every day. VivaFlora Optimax reduced the severity and duration of the foals diarrhea. The foals of supplemented mares suffered 3 times fewer diarrhea days as compared to the control group. The reduction was statistically significant (Anova test p < 0.05). Moreover, in contrast to the control group, the foals from the supplemented group did not require external treatments in order to fully recover.
Med. Weter. 2013, 69 (3) 172
nistration of five lactobacilli strains, isolated from healthy horses, to newborn foals enhanced their growth by 8% and decreased the incidence of diarrhea (20). In contrast to these results, the administration of L. pen-tosus WE7 to new born foals, an equine-origin micro-organism with potentially beneficial in vitro properties, as a probiotic for prevention of neonatal diarrhea in foals, did not prevent diarrhea. Probiotic-treated foals suffered more days of diarrhea, in comparison to the control group, although not significantly more (19).
The aim of the study was to evaluate the effect of supplementation of heat treated lactic acid and pro-pionic bacteria species designed for increasing horses resistance to gut diseases in Thoroughbred mares diet during late gestation and early lactation on foals diarrhea episodes and severity.
Material and methods
The experiment was conducted in a Krasne stable for 3 months, from the 17th of February to the 12th of May, 2011.
The stable has had over 200 years tradition of breeding Thoroughbreds for racing.
Twenty seven Thoroughbred mares were randomly assigned to two groups: 14 mares (from 6 to 18-years-old, average age: 10-years-old) were supplemented with 5 g of Vivaflor Optimax per day. Thirteen mares (from 6 to 20-years-old, average age: 13-years-old) in the control group were not supplemented.
Before the start of the experiment, 3 mares in the supple-mented group already had a foal each (born on the 28th of
January, 7th and 8th of February) as well as 3 mares from the
control group (foals born on the 20th and 28th of January and
the 13th of February). All the other mares had a foal each
during the experiment. The mares were housed in individual box stalls until the 29th of April.
The basal diet corresponded to usual feeding practices in Polish horse breeding regions. The daily feed ration con-sisted of hay permanent, 1.5 kg of oats twice a day and 2 kg of granulated horse feed (Horsgran). From the 29th of April
the mares which had given birth 5 days earlier were given access to pasture on grass. The basal diet was adapted and consisted of fresh grass, hay permanent, 1.5 kg of oats twice a day (morning and evening).
VivaFlor Optimax is commercialized by DuPont/Danisco as a feed additive designed for improving horses intestinal microbial balance and increasing their
resi-stance to gut diseases. It is a blend of two separately fermented milks with selected bac-teria, and then heat treated after fermentation, dried and standardized with grain soybean carrier. One portion of milk is fermented with Lactobacillus farciminis and Lactobacillus rhamnosus (VivaFlor Nutrition 03-DF), the second with Propionibacterium and Lacto-bacillus plantarum (VivaFlor Nutrition 01-DF). The final commercial blend contains at least 1 × 109 of dead microbial cells/g of formulation.
Mares in the experimental group were on a diet supplemented every evening with VivaFlor Optimax for 3 months.
VivaFlor Optimax contains the following ingredients: crushed expanded corn, crushed soya, micronized corn bran, seaweed meal, milk powder and their microbial fermen-tation derivatives, dead microorganisms of Lactobacillus and Propionibacterium, molasses, silicon dioxide, calcium propionate and inactivated yeast.
The chemical composition of the formulation is as follows: crude proteins 129.3 g/kg, crude cellulose 30.5 g/kg, ash 90.4 g/kg and moisture 12%.
For experimental and control groups the number of diar-rhea days, the medicine treatment, appearance and behavior of the mares and foals were recorded every day.
When applying Anova test (at p < 0.05) Proc GLM pro-cedures of SAS were applied for evaluation of the signifi-cant differences between the VivaFlor Optimax supplemen-ted group and the control group in respect of the number of diarrhea days in new born foals.
Results and discussion
Nine foals from the control group had diarrhea as opposed to only 6 foals from the group in which mares were supplemented with VivaFlor Optimax. The number of diarrhea days was 32 (4.65% of total life days of foals during the experiment) and 117 (15.18% of total life days) for supplemented and control groups, respectively (Tab. 1). Reduction of the number of days with diarrhea episodes for the supplemented group was significant (Anova test p < 0.05). Total time of the foals diarrhea episodes was over 3 times shorter in the group in which the mares diet was supplemented with VivaFlor Optimax. Recovery time from diarrhea episodes was 5.3 and 13 days on average for the sup-plemented and non-supsup-plemented groups, respectively (Tab. 1).
Moreover, the foals in the control group needed external treatments to fully recover from diarrhea, while the foals in the supplemented group did not require any medication. In addition, the supplemented mares generally showed a shinier coat cover as com-pared to the control group, suggesting a positive effect of the supplementation on the overall metabolism (data not shown).
Among horse breeds, Thoroughbreds are the most susceptible to infectious diseases. VivaFlor Optimax
Tab. 1. The effect of VivaFlor Optimax supplementation in mares diet on new born foals diarrhea episodes
s e r a m f o s p u o r G Notsupplemented VisvuapFplolermOepnittmedax s e d o s i p e a e h rr a i d h ti w s l a o f f o r e b m u N 9 6 s l a o f d e t c e ff a a e h rr a i d f o e g a t n e c r e P 75 43 s y a d a e h rr a i d s 'l a o f f o r e b m u n l a t o T 117 32 e fi l f o s y a d s u s r e v s y a d a e h rr a i d f o e g a t n e c r e P t n e m ir e p x e e h t g n ir u d 15.2 4.7 a e h rr a i d h ti w s y a d f o s r e b m u n m u m i x a M 43 7 e d o s i p e a e h rr a i d r e p s y a d f o r e b m u n e g a r e v A 13 5.3 t n e m t a e rt e n i c i d e M yes no
Med. Weter. 2013, 69 (3) 173
significantly (Anova test p < 0.05) decreased the number of diarrhea days of the new born foals when the mares were on a supplemented diet and helped to reduce the cost of medications.
This suggests that the DuPont/Danisco fermentation milk product based on 3 specifically selected lactic acid bacteria strains (L. plantarum, L. rhamnosus and L. farciminis) and propionic bacteria sp. has a positive effect on mares and results in a better environment for foals. According to the laws in force in Europe, VivaFlor Optimax is a supplementary feed because the bacteria have been inactivated in the heating process. The formulation is very stable at room temperature. These facts facilitate its use, which is possible without long and more expensive procedures of registration required for live microbiota and without the necessity of formulation storage at cooling temperature. Our results can also shed a new light on in the past com-monly neglected role of dead bacteria in the health status of the host. The results can also confirm previous studies of Fablaudier et al. (6) on the beneficial effects of live Propionibacteria and Lactobacillus plantarum, as well as heat treated strains of Lactobacillus rham-nosus and Lactobacillus farciminis on the fecal micro-bial communities and activities in horses. In other studies, supplementation of a horses diet with live Pro-pionibacteria and Lactobacillus plantarum enhanced organic matter and cell-walls digestibility (8).
The phenomenon of diarrhea episodes and the reduction of their severity with VivaFlor Optimax can be related to the specific antimicrobial activities of the microbial fermented products, including bacteriocins (3, 16), which can stabilize mare microbiota and improve a mares digestive track before foaling. This can help to reduce the transmission of pathogens from a mare to the new born foal. VivaFlor Optimax may also reduce diarrhea severity of foals by milk quality improvement (7).
More advanced studies are needed to confirm the mechanisms of action of the Vivaflor Optimax fermen-ted powder in mares and the beneficial effects in new born foals.
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Authors address: Dr in¿. Piotr Ko³akowski, 1A Tuwima Str., 10-747 Olsztyn, Poland; e-mail: piotr.kolakowski@danisco.com
