Influence of Dietary Oligosaccharides on Growth Performance and Intestinal Microbial Populations of Piglets

An experiment was conducted to determine the effects of dietary oligosaccharides on performance and intestinal microbial populations of piglets. Ten litters of piglets were assigned to five groups randomly, with two litters per group. The control group was fed with corn-soybean basal diet. Oligosaccharides was added to the basal diet at the level of 0.05%, 0.1%, 0.2% and 0.35% respectively to form four experimental diets. The experiment was conducted with two periods. The first period (suckling period) was from 7 to 28 days of age and the second period (weanling period) was from 28 to 56 days of age. Fresh fecal samples were collected at 21 days of age and assayed for Escherichia coli concentration, pH and moisture content. Three pigs per group were slaughtered at 42 days of age and cecum, colon, and rectum content samples were collected and assayed immediately for Escherichia coli and Bifidobacterium concentration, pH and moisture content. The results showed that dietary oligosacchrides decreased fecal Escherichia coli population and pH significantly (p 0.05), but did not affect performance and fecal moisture content during suckling period. 0.1% oligosaccharides for weanling pigs increased growth and improved feed conversion ratio together with a reduction of diarrhea (p 0.05), but 0.35% oligosaccharides did not affect growth performance. 0.1% and 0.2% oligosaccharides for weanling pigs had a suppression to Escherichia coli colonization in rectum and an enrichment to Bifidobacterium in colon (p 0.05). Oligosaccharides decreased significantly (p<0.05) rectum moisture content, but did not affect cecum, colon and rectum pH.