Effects of Dietary Herbal Plant Mixture (Koppuul~R) on Growth Performance, Blood Immunological Parameters, Fecal VFA and NH_3-N Concentrations in Growing Pigs

摘要

This study was conducted to investigate the effects of dietary herbal plant mixture on growth performance, blood immunological parameters, fecal VFA and NH_3-N concentrations in growing" pigs. The dietary treatments were 1) NC (negative control; antibiotics-free diet), 2) PC (positive contnol; NC diet added 0.16% antibiotic), 3) NCK0.2 (NC diet added 0.2% herbal plant mixture (koppuuL~R)) and 4) PCKO.l (PC diet added 0.1% herbal plant mixture (koppuul~R)). Eighty crossbred (Landrace x Yorkshire x Duroc) pigs (16.35 +- 0.05 kg average initial body weight) were used for 42 days. The pigs were assigned to the treatments according to body weight and each treatment had 5 replicates of 4 pigs per pen in a randomized complete block design. During the wholeexperimental period, PCKO.l and PC treatments had significantly higher ADGthan NC treatment (P<0.05). Gain/feed of pigs fed PC diet was higher than that of pigs fed NC diet (P<0.05). For blood immunological parameters investigations, white blood cells (WBC) counts and IgG level increased in the pigs fed PC, NCK0.2 and PCKO.l diets compared to pigs fed NC diet. In addition, higher (P<0.05) serum lymphocyte concentration was found in PCKO.l treatment compared to NC treatment. NH_3-N concentration in pigsfed NCKO.2% diet was lower than that in pigs fed PC and NC diets. There were no significant differences in DM and N digestibilities among the treatments. In conclusion, the results suggested that the dietary additions of herbal plant mixture or antibiotics increase ADG, the concentrations of WBC counts and IgG, lymphocyte, while decrease NH_3-N concentration in feces.