Skip to main content
ARS Home » Plains Area » Bushland, Texas » Conservation and Production Research Laboratory » Livestock Nutrient Management Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #362796
Research Project: Improved Practices to Conserve Air Quality, Maintain Animal Productivity, and Enhance Use of Manure and Soil Nutrients of Cattle Production Systems for the Southern Great Plains

Location: Livestock Nutrient Management Research

Title: Potential role of rumen microbiota in altering average daily gain and feed efficiency in meat goats fed simple and mixed pastures using bacterial tag-encoded FLX amplicon pyrosequencing

Author
item Min, Byeng Ryel
item GURUNG, NAR - Tuskegee University
item SHANGE, RAYMOND - Tuskegee University
item SOLAIMAN, SANDRA - Tuskegee University

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 5/3/2019
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Our objective was to examine whether the comparative abundance of the Bacteroidetes (B) and Firmicutes (F) bacterial phyla in meat goats fed simple and mixed forages influenced average daily gain (ADG), rumen fermentation parameters and bacterial diversity changes using a tag-encoded FLX amplicon pyrosequencing (bTEFAP). Thirty-six Kiko-cross growing meat goats (Body Weight = 27.7 ± 2.83) at approximate age of 7 months were used in this study. Animals were randomly allocated to three pasture treatment groups (n = 12) as follows: (1) bermudagrass (BG; Cynodon dactylon), (2) sun hemp (SH; Crotalaria juncea) forage, and (3) BG + SH forage combinations for 45 days. Results indicated that there were no differences in initial BW among treatments, but final BW and ADG were higher (P < 0.01) for SH and BG + SH combinations than for BG alone. We investigated the alterations between the different forage diets and found that ADG and rumen fermentation (A/P ratio), were highly correlated with the abundance of various bacterial populations within the rumen microbiome. There were linear decreases in percentage of Bacteroidetes (R2 = -0.84; P < 0.05) associated with decreasing ADG. In contrast, increased ADG was linearly associated with higher percentages of Firmicutes (R2 = 0.79; P < 0.05), F/B ratio (R2 = 0.88; P = 0.07), total VFA (R2 = 0.45; P < 0.05), and lower A/P ratio (R2 = -0.72; P < 0.01). This suggests that the substrate and bacterial community have the role in adapting host biological parameters in meat goats. The abundance examination of both Bacteroidetes and Firmicutes will be useful for exploring the structure of gut microbiota as an estimate of animal performance.