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Abstract
This study was carried out to investigate the effects of bamboo charcoal on the growth performance, immune responses of blood, faecal gas emission and faecal microflora in fattening pigs. Crossed pigs (n =1 08) were fed basal diet (C) and supplemented with 0.3% (T1) and 0.6% (T2) of bamboo charcoal for 42 days (12 heads per pen×3 diets×3 replications). The average daily gain (ADG) and feed efficiency were higher (P < 0.05) in T1 and T2 than in C. The concentration of lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), triglyceride and blood urea nitrogen (BUN) as well as faecal gas emission, such as ammonia, methane, amine and hydrogen sulphide were lower (P < 0.05) in T2, while the concentration of cortisol and counts of faecal enterobacteriaceae, Escherichia coli and Salmonella spp. were lower (P<0.05) in T1 and T2 compared with the C. Concentration of IgG and count of faecal Lactobacillus spp. were higher (P<0.05) in treatments. Based on these results, bamboo charcoal increased the growth performance, feed efficiency and faecal beneficial microflora composition, but decreased the faecal noxious gas emission in fattening pigs.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the Priority Research Centers Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF), funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (2009-0093813) and Gyeongnam National University of Science and Technology Grant at 2012. The authors would like also to thank Borim Inc., Jinju, Korea for their kind help with supporting materials. This research was also supported by iPET (Korea Institute of Planning and Evaluation for Technology in Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries), Ministry for Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Repulic of Korea.