Role of Acidifier in Poultry

Introduction:

The major purpose of using this acidifier is to improve growth performance and better the profitability in poultry production. Organic acids have multi usages in poultry feeds as they help in preservation to control microbial growth, reduction of the feed buffer capacity, inhibition of pathogenic bacteria and betterment of nutrient digestibility.

The performance of poultry is enhanced by the addition of organic acids in diet as these organic acids decrease the pathogenic bacteria from feed. Most commonly the bacteria that affect the gut health of poultry include Salmonella, Clostridia, Entrococcus, Campylobacter and Escherichia coli.

Why are acidifier used as feed additives?

Broadly, the acidic specificities of acidifiers as feed additives are attributed to the carboxyl functional group, -COOH of the organic acids, including the fatty and amino acids.

What is an Organic Acid:

Organic Acid is an organic compound with acidic properties associated with their Carboxyl group –COOH group. In General Organic acids are considered to be any carboxylic acid including fatty acid & amino acid.?Organic Acids are weak Acid & do not disassociate completely in water.

Why is Organic acids good for poultry?

Supplementation of the mixture of organic acid in the broiler birds diet may lead to an increase in overall digestibility and availability of nutrients (such as Ca and P) due to developing beneficial micro?ora (Lactobacillusspp.) of the digestive tract.

Role of organic Acids in Poultry:

Role of organic acids as a feed supplement in poultry has a beneficial effect on the overall performance of the broiler a well as layer birds. The effect of an individual organic acid is variable and depends upon several factors. Similarly different pathogenic bacteria respond variably to various organic acids.

Water acidifier in poutry:

A liquid acidifier for poultry drinking water based on a synergistic combination of organic acids, inorganic acid, trace element copper, and bioflavonoids. The acids lower the pH and thereby improve the digestion of nutrients and inhibit the growth of pathogenic bacteria, moulds , and yeast.

How to improve Poultry drinking water Quality with Acidification?

Sanitization, regular testing, checking for biofilm in pipes and thoroughly cleaning lines between flocks can all help to ensure poultry drinking water quality is as high as possible. Adding an enhanced poultry acidifier product will deliver additional performance benefits as well as reducing the level of bacteria in the water.

The short-chain acids (C1–C7) are found to be associated with antimicrobial activity. They are either simple mono-carboxylic acids such as formic, acetic, propionic and butyric acids or carboxylic acids with the hydroxyl group such as lactic, malic, tartaric and citric acids or short-chain carboxylic acids containing double bonds like fumaric and sorbic acids (Shahidi et. al., 2014). Generally organic acids with antimicrobial activities have a pKa value in the range of 3 and 5.

Organic acid treatments composed of individual acids and blends of several acids have been found to perform antimicrobial activities similar to those of antibiotics (Wang et al. 2009). The European Union allowed the use of organic acids and their salts in poultry production because these are generally considered safe (Adil et al. 2010). Organic acids have been used for decades in commercial compound feeds, mostly for feed preservation, for which formic and propionic acids are particularly effective (Lückst?dt, 2014 ). In the European Union, these two organic acids and several others (lactic, citric, fumaric and sorbic acids) and their salts (e.g. calcium formate, calcium propionate) are used under the classi?cation ‘feed preservative’ (Lückst?dt & Mellor, 2011).

Application ways of Acidifiers:

• Sprayed as a liquid directly in to feedstuff & compound feed.
• Powder forms are added directly or via premix.
• Liquid form via drinking water

Mode of action:??????

Un-dissociated form of acid RCOOH has the ability to penetrate the bacterial cell wall. Once in the bacterial cell, The higher pH of cytoplasm cause dissociation of the acids, and the resulting reduction in pH due to the release of H+ disrupt the enzymatic reactions & nutrient transport system. This results into destruction of the cytoplasm, and further growth of the bacteria is inhibited. Molecule of organic acid also attacks the DNA of bacteria results in its death.

Organic acid usage in Poultry as Antimicrobial agent:

Disease Control: E. Coli, Salmonella, Clostridia, Entrococcus etc.

The performance of poultry is enhanced by the addition of organic acids in diet as these organic acids decrease the pathogenic bacteria from feed. Most commonly the bacteria that affect the gut health of poultry include Salmonella, Clostridia, Entrococcus, Campylobacter and Escherichia coli. These can be checked by inclusion of an organic acid in the diet. The most important basic principle on which these acidifiers work is that the non-dissociated organic acids can penetrate the bacteria cell wall and destroy the normal physiological functions of pH sensitive bacteria (meaning that they cannot tolerate a wide internal and external pH gradient). Adding to that, the organic acids in poultry seem to have a direct effect on the bacterial population of gastrointestinal tract (GIT). individual acid has its own range of microbial activity in terms of pH range, membrane structure, physiology etc. Generally the mixture or combination of acids shows different pKa values and have a broad spectrum activity.

Organic acid usage in Poultry to improve Nutrient Digestibility:

Organic acids have been considered to be suitable alternatives for improving nutrient digestibility. Organic acids are supposed to lower the pH of the chyme and thereby enhanced the protein digestibility. Addition of organic acids may also improve the digestibility of minerals.?Supplementation of the mixture of organic acid in the broiler birds diet may lead to an increase in overall digestibility and availability of nutrients (such as Ca and P) due to developing beneficial micro?ora (Lactobacillus spp.) of the digestive tract. The low ME of a soybean meal for poultry is due mainly to the very poor digestibility of the carbohydrate fraction. The galacto-oligosaccharides in the soyabean meal cannot be digested in the small intestine of poultry because of the absence of the endogenous α-(1, 6)-galactosidase enzyme (Lee et al. 2015). Ao (2005), added 2% citric acid to the soyabean meal as substrates in the in vitro trial. The result indicated that addition of citric acid increased the activity of α-galactosidase resulting in decreased the crop pH. He reported that citric acid decreased the crop pH and enhanced the activity of α-galactosidase in the crop in vivo trial.

Organic acid usage in Poultry to improve GIT:

Having a sound intestinal health of poultry is one of the key aspects to achieve best growth rate, production performance and feed e?ciency. It has been found that organic acid supplementation signi?cantly increases the villus width, height and area of the duodenum, jejunum and ileum of broiler chicks. Garcia et al. (2007), reported that broilers fed diets containing formic acid had the longest villi (1273 and 1250 μm for 0.5 and 1.0% formic acid, respectively) compared with control (1088 μm). Similarly, crypts of jejunum were deeper in birds fed the formic acid diet (1.0%) than birds fed the antibiotic diets (266 vs. 186 μm, respectively; P < .05) in the same experiment. Thus, formic acid supplementation increased both the villus height and crypt depth.

Organic acid usage in Poultry to improve Broiler Performance:

Organic acids have growth promoting properties and can be used as alternatives to antibiotics (Fascina et al.(2012). Fascina et al. (2012) reported that the use of an organic acids mixture (comprising 30.0% lactic acid, 25.5% benzoic acid, 7% formic acid, 8% citric acid and 6.5% acetic acid) in broiler diets improved its performance as compared to the control diet at 42 days of age and organic acids provided better carcass characteristics. Supplementation of organic acids in feed is found to improve the production parameters like body weight and feed conversion ratio (FCR) in broiler chicken. The improvement may be attributed to better utilization of nutrients resulting in increased body weight gain in the birds supplemented with organic acids in the feed.

Organic acid usage in Poultry to improve Layer Performance:

Organic acids also play role in improving the overall growth and performance of Layer birds. The antimicrobial activity of the organic acid would have led to such an expected effect as a result of improvement in total nutrient digestibility, thereby improving the feed e?ciency and the rate of egg laying. Addition of organic acid probably improved hen-housed egg production by decreasing soft-shell plus broken egg production, FCR and mortality. External egg qualities such as egg weight, egg length, egg diameter and egg shell colour may also be improved by using organic acids.

Some other Crucial Roles:

·????????Improve digestive enzyme activity

·????????Growth of gastrointestinal mucosa

·????????Increased pancreatic secretion

Conclusion:

The use of acidifier complexes enables minimization of the development of pathogenic flora in feed and/or water and therefore optimises digestive function by promoting beneficial acidophilus bacteria. Vitalac is a pioneer in acidification in poultry farms. The range which has been developed provides a response to several problems encountered:

Role of organic acids as a feed supplement in poultry has a beneficial effect on the overall performance of the broiler a well as layer birds. The effect of an individual organic acid is variable and depends upon several factors. Similarly different pathogenic bacteria respond variably to various organic acids. Organic acids have direct effect on different GIT parameters and improve the nutrient absorption and digestibility.