ARS | Publication request: Enhanced Survivability of Very Young Nursery Reared Piglets Treated with a Porcine Derived Competitive Exclusion Culture

Submitted to: Proceedings of Allen D Leman Swine Conference
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: August 5, 1998
Publication Date: N/A

Technical Abstract: Pork production in certain regions of the U.S. is being curtailed due to environmental concerns and thus in order to expand production the industry is under pressure to maximize survivability of all pigs born. Rearing of weaker piglets in nurseries, beginning as early as 24 hr of age, is one strategy to ensuring that these have ample opportunity for nourishment but at this age the immaturity of the gut flora may predispose these piglets to enteric and systemic diseases. We report results from experiments designed to test if competitive exclusion, which facilitates early establishment of a mature gut flora, could provide protection to piglets reared in this manner. Piglets from 2 sows were treated at birth with a porcine competitive exclusion culture (pCF1) and piglets from two other sows served as controls. At 48 hr of age, the piglets were removed from their sows, placed in a nursery, orally challenged with 10**5 colony forming units of Salmonella choleraesuis and provided ad libutum access to liquid milk replacer. In the 1st experiment, mortality among the pCF1 treated litter (n=5) and untreated litter (n=7) was 20 and 57%, respectively, by seven days post challenge. In the 2nd experiment, 10 of 10 of the control piglets died by 4 days post challenge whereas only 2 of the 5 pCF1 treated piglets had died. None of the remaining piglets showed signs of disease throughout the experiment which was concluded 18 days post challenge. These observations demonstrate the protective effect of pCF1 to pigs.