11 Oct Boosting Poultry Health and Productivity with Probiotics
In this article, we explore how probiotics can help Australian chicken and egg producers maintain sustainable, profitable businesses while they care for their chickens’ welfare.
Australians love their chooks!
Around 70% of Australian households enjoy a chicken meal at least twice weekly.1
As well as being easy to prepare, Australians believe that eating chicken is a healthier, lower-fat option than other meats – plus it’s cheaper.
All this means that growing chickens is big business. There are around 800 poultry meat producers in Australia. The gross value of poultry farm production in 2022/2023 is estimated at $3.105 billion. 1
The chicken meat industry is also an essential Australian employer, with an estimated 22,179 people working in primary production and processing.
And then there’s the humble egg. An excellent source of high-quality, affordable protein, here are just a few stats on egg production and consumption in Australia 2:
- Australians consume 18.5 million eggs every day.
- In the 2021-22 financial year, Australian egg farmers produced 6.6 billion eggs or 552.7 million dozen eggs.
- In June 2022, Australia’s egg industry reported a national flock size of 21,187,854 layers.
- This country’s three main egg farming systems are free-range, cage and barn-laid. Free-range egg production has grown significantly over the last 15 years, making up 52% of all grocery retail sales.
Healthy chickens are good for business!
Maintaining the health of your chickens is crucial for ensuring a profitable and productive business. Of course, it’s also good farming practice and good news for consumers.
The use of probiotics in chicken production isn’t new. With increased productivity, producers have long used probiotics to protect animals against pathogens and bacterial resistance, especially in large-scale operations.
What exactly are probiotics?
Probiotics are “a culture of specific living micro-organisms (primarily Lactobacillus spp.) which implants in the animal to ensure the effective establishment of intestinal populations of both beneficial and pathogenic organisms”.3
The digestive tract of an ordinary, healthy, non-stressed chicken contains a balance of beneficial and non-beneficial bacteria. When animals become stressed, the beneficial flora tends to decrease, and the non-beneficial flora decreases. The rearing conditions and the age of the animals also affect the gut microbiota.3
This imbalance results in poultry that are prone to disease. It can also lead to a decline in growth and feed efficiency.
The gut microbiome plays a crucial role in poultry’s overall health and performance. It influences nutrient absorption, disease resistance, and even stress levels.
10 benefits of using probiotics in chicken and egg production
Probiotics have proven their ability to improve digestive health, enhance immune function, reduce stress, and enhance food safety in poultry production. Here are some of the benefits outlined in various research papers on the topic:
1. Improved Digestive Health: Probiotics promote a healthy gut microbiome in chickens, which can lead to improved nutrient absorption and digestion. This results in better feed conversion rates, reduced feed costs, and increased growth rates. 20-25% of the improvement in growth is due to improved nutrition4 and feed efficiency.
2. Reduced Incidence of Diseases: Probiotics can bolster the immune system of poultry, reducing the likelihood of infections and diseases. This can lead to lower mortality rates, reduced veterinary expenses, and a more sustainable production system.3
3. Improved Stress Management: Transportation and changes in environmental conditions can put stress on animals. Probiotics are proven to help chickens cope with stress, which can lead to better overall well-being and productivity.5
4. Enhanced Egg Production: Probiotics may improve egg production rates and quality. Hens supplemented with probiotics have been found to lay more eggs with thicker eggshells, helping to increase the profitability of egg production.6
5. Food Safety and Quality: Probiotics can potentially reduce the prevalence of harmful pathogens like Salmonella and Campylobacter. This enhances food safety and contributes to the reputation and quality of poultry products.3
6. Reduced Use of Antibiotics: Though antibiotic use in the Australian poultry industry is lower than overseas, their use has raised concerns about antibiotic resistance and residues in meat and eggs. Probiotics offer a natural alternative to antibiotics, allowing producers to reduce their reliance on these drugs while maintaining animal health.7
7. Environmental Sustainability: By improving feed efficiency and reducing the need for antibiotics, probiotics can contribute to a more environmentally sustainable poultry farming system. This aligns with the increasing consumer demand for environmentally friendly and ethical food production practices.
8. Consumer Demand: Consumers are becoming more conscious of the quality and safety of their food. Poultry producers using probiotics can market their products as being produced with natural and health-promoting additives, meeting the demands of health-conscious consumers.8
9. Regulatory Compliance: As regulations on antibiotic use in animal agriculture become stricter, the use of probiotics as an alternative can help poultry producers stay compliant with evolving industry standards and government regulations. 9
10. Economic Benefits: While some costs are associated with using probiotic supplements, the potential for improved production efficiency, reduced disease-related losses, and higher product quality can lead to long-term economic benefits for poultry producers.
When it comes to using probiotics in chicken meat and egg production, what’s not to love?
Introducing NEW Opti-Gut Probiotics for Poultry
Based on years of research and their application in the field, probiotics are proven to lead to better health, increased productivity, reduced disease risks, and improved product quality.
These benefits align with the economic and ethical goals of modern poultry farming, making probiotics an attractive option for producers in Australia and beyond.
We have now developed Opti-Gut Probiotics for Poultry, a natural and affordable probiotic supplement to support Australian poultry producers.
Opti-Gut is a potent, high-strength, multi-strain microbial mix that replenishes gut flora and improves nutrient absorption. It comes in an easy-to-feed ‘crumble’ formula and also contains humic and fulvic acids and activated zeolite. These ingredients help stabilise the animal’s intestinal flora and assist in feed efficiency.
We recommend blending Opti-Gut with their grain rations at a rate of 0.2 to 0.5 per gram of body weight per bird per day (2 to 3 grams based on an average 1.5kg chicken). You can now buy Opti-Gut for your chooks from our online store:
The physical environment – the bedding and feed pen conditions – also plays a vital role in the health of poultry. You may also be interested in reading our article: Why Bio-Hum is ideal for use in bedding and intensive feeding environments
Interested in reading the research?
Because of the importance of chickens as a source of nutrition, there’s plenty of research available on the use of probiotics in animal production. Here are a couple of studies we found interesting:
- In their 2020 study, The Gut Microbiota of Laying Hens and Its Manipulation with Prebiotics and Probiotics, researchers came up with these key findings: A healthy gut microbiota is good for animal health and immunity. Helping to control the growth of pathogens (like Salmonella and Campylobacter) enhances food safety and supports animal performance.
- The study Effects of probiotic supplementation on performance traits, bone mineralization, cecal microbial composition, cytokines and corticosterone in laying hens, concluded “the dietary probiotic inclusion improves bone mineralization in aged White Leghorn laying hens without detrimental effects on egg production and eggshell quality. Instead, probiotic supplementation concomitantly reduces unmarketable egg production.”
REFERENCES
- Australian Chicken Meat Federation https://chicken.org.au/our-product/facts-and-figures/
- https://www.australianeggs.org.au/egg-industry
- The Role of Probiotics in the Poultry Industry by S. M. Lutful Kabir https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/10/8/3531
- Poultry Hub https://www.poultryhub.org/production/meat-chicken-broiler-industry#:~:text=There%20are%20currently%20more%20than%20800%20commercial%20meat%20chicken%20growers%20in%20Australia
- The Impact of Probiotic Bacillus subtilis on Injurious Behavior in Laying Hens, Sha Jiang, Jia-Ying Hu and Heng-Wei Cheng https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8997090/
- Enhancing egg production and quality by the supplementation of probiotic strains (Clostridium and Brevibacillus) via improved amino acid digestibility, intestinal health, immune response, and antioxidant activity, Uchechukwu Edna Obianwuna, Kai Qiu, Xin-yu Chang, Hai-jun Zhang, Jing Wang, Guang-hai Qi, Tie-hu Sun, corresponding author , Yong-bo Su and Shu-geng Wu corresponding author https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9512665/
- ABC News – The Debate over the overuse of antibiotics in our meat https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-19/the-debate-over-the-use-of-antibiotics-in-our-meat/102244270
- Productive Performances of Slow-Growing Chicken Breeds and Their Crosses with a Commercial Strain in Conventional and Free-Range Farming Systems Edoardo Fiorilla, Data curation, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing, Visualization,1,* Marco Birolo, Conceptualization, Writing – review & editing, Funding acquisition,2 Ugo Ala, Formal analysis,1 Gerolamo Xiccato, Conceptualization, Writing – review & editing, Funding acquisition, Angela Trocino, Conceptualization, Writing – review & editing, Funding acquisition, Achille Schiavone, Writing – review & editing and Cecilia Mugnai, Conceptualization, Writing – review & editing, Supervision, Project administration https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10417706/#:~:text=Simple%20Summary,’%20development%2C%20and%20ethical%20farming.
- An updated review on probiotics as an alternative of antibiotics in poultry — A review Muhammad Umar Yaqoob, Geng Wang and Minqi Wang corresponding author https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9262730/