The effect of calcium propionate on the ruminal bacterial community composition in finishing bulls.

Qianqian Yao,Yan Li,Zhenming Zhou,Qingxiang Meng

doi:10.5713/ajas.16.0469

Abstract

ObjectiveManipulating the fermentation to improve the performance of the ruminant has attracted the attention of both farmers and animal scientists. Propionate salt supplementation in the diet could disturb the concentration of propionate and total volatile fatty acids in the rumen. This study was conducted to evaluate the effect of calcium propionate supplementation on the ruminal bacterial community composition in finishing bulls.MethodsEight finishing bulls were randomly assigned to control group (CONT) and calcium propionate supplementation (PROP) feeding group, with four head per group. The control group was fed normal the total mixed ration (TMR) finishing diet, and PROP group was fed TMR supplemented with 200 g/d calcium propionate. At the end of the 51-day feeding trial, all bulls were slaughtered and rumen fluid was collected from each of the animals.ResultsPropionate supplementation had no influence the rumen fermentation parameters (p>0.05). Ruminal bacterial community composition was analyzed by sequencing of hypervariable V3 regions of the 16S rRNA gene. The most abundant phyla were the Firmicutes (60.68%) and Bacteroidetes (23.67%), followed by Tenericutes (4.95%) and TM7 (3.39%). The predominant genera included Succiniclasticum (9.43%), Butyrivibrio (3.74%), Ruminococcus (3.46%) and Prevotella (2.86%). Bacterial community composition in the two groups were highly similar, except the abundance of Tenericutes declined along with the calcium propionate supplementation (p = 0.0078).ConclusionThese data suggest that the ruminal bacterial community composition is nearly unchanged by propionate supplementation in finishing bulls.

Highlights

Ruminants harbor a diverse microbial community to break down dietary plant material to fermentation, and the host requires ruminal fermentation end products for body maintenance and growth, and milk production
Our objective was to investigate the effect of propionate supplementation on ruminal bacterial community composition in finishing bulls by using pyrosequencing of 16s RNA gene
Another report showed that propionate salt in a concentrate based lamb diet (65%, dry matter) had no effect on the concentration of propionate in the rumen of finishing lambs consuming mixed rations [9], which was similar to our results

Summary

Introduction

Ruminants harbor a diverse microbial community to break down dietary plant material to fermentation, and the host requires ruminal fermentation end products for body maintenance and growth, and milk production. Calcium propionate supplementation increased the concentration of propionate in the rumen [5,6,8]. Providing propionate to ruminants may influence microbial dynamics due to the changing of the propionate concentrate in the rumen. Few studies have reported the effect of propionate supplementation on ruminal microbial diversity in finishing stage. It is necessary to understand the bacterial community composition changes in response to calcium propionate supplementation. We hypothesize that calcium propionate addition may disturb the ruminal microbial ecology in finishing bulls. Our objective was to investigate the effect of propionate supplementation on ruminal bacterial community composition in finishing bulls by using pyrosequencing of 16s RNA gene

Results

Discussion

Conclusion