Microbiological Assessment of Poultry Feeds within Ilorin, Nigeria

Ismaila Olawale Sule,Israel Oluwatunmise Ilori

doi:10.15835/nsb9110025

Abstract

The poultry feeds were obtained from 20 different poultry pens and their microbial contents were assessed. The antibiotics resistance patterns of the bacterial isolates were also determined. The bacterial count ranged from 5.0 × 103 to 1.76 × 106 cfu/g while the fungal count ranged from 3.5 × 104 to 1.9 × 105 cfu/g. The bacterial species isolated were Streptococcus salivarius, Streptococcus pyogenes, Micrococcus luteus, Micrococcus varians, Micrococcus roseus, Staphylococcus aureus, Staphylococcus saprophyticus and Staphylococcus hominis, while the fungal species isolated were Saccharomyces cerevisisae, Fusarium oxysporum, Penicillium sp., Humicola grisea, Aspergillus fumigatus, Hansenula sp. and Humicola fuscoatra. All the bacterial isolates were resistant to ceftazidime and cefuroxime and all the isolates were resistant to at least three antibiotics. Ofloxacin produced the highest zone of inhibition, followed by gentamicin, and then erythromycin. The presence of some pathogenic microorganisms in the poultry feeds revealed high level of contaminations. It is recommended that poultry feeds should be made from good quality grains and it should be prevented from environmental or other contamination.

Highlights

Poultry is the second most widely eaten meat in the world, accounting for about 38% of the world meat (Raloff, 2003)
Microbial counts of poultry feeds The bacterial and fungal counts of the poultry feeds ranged from 5.0 × 103 to 1.76 × 106 cfu/g and 3.5 × to 1.59 × cfu/g respectively (Table 1)
The high occurrence of fungal and bacterial species is of public health concern and this may indicate obvious health hazard in terms of direct consumption of contaminated feed or their toxins by farm animals (Aliyu et al, 2016)

Summary

Introduction

Poultry is the second most widely eaten meat in the world, accounting for about 38% of the world meat (Raloff, 2003). Poultry feeds are food materials used in raising poultry birds and are designed to contain all the nutritional materials needed for proper growth, meat and egg production in birds. Antibiotics such as bacitracin, tetracycline, oxytetracycline, chlorotetracycline have been incorporated into poultry feed formulations usually at low prophylactic level to prevent minor diseases and enhance efficient growth (Smith, 2005). The poultry industries rely on the supply of ready-to use feed from feed mills (Aganaga et al, 2000) These packaged feeds from feed mills constitute the main source of feeds for poultry farmers. The involvement of poultry feeds in the transmission of aflatoxicosis, which is the most prevalent and economically significant mycotoxin, represents the main concern to the poultry farmers and extended consumers (Aliyu et al, 2016)

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