Effect of Maternal Dietary Yeast Supplementation during Late Gestation and Early Lactation on Foal Growth and Development from Birth to Weaning
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Date
2013-05
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The Ohio State University
Abstract
Dietary yeast supplementation in horses has been reported to influence nutrient digestibility and milk production in mares. Altering the nutrient composition of the milk from mares may influence the growth of their foals. The objective of this study was to determine if dietary yeast supplementation of the maternal diets would influence foal growth and development. Eight Quarter Horse mares (14.5 ± 7.5yr) were randomly assigned to one of two groups: Yeast or Control. All mares received 0.5% BW of a 16% CP pelleted concentrate, with water and mixed grass hay ad libitum. Mares in the yeast treatment group were fed a targeted dose of 1 g/ 45.4 kg of BW per day of a live culture of Saccharomyces cerevisiae for a period of 180 d. Growth measurements (body weight, body length, heart girth, wither and hip height, upper and lower leg length, and front/rear cannon bone circumference) were taken on d 0, 7, 14, 21, 28, 35, 42, 49, 56, 70, 84, 98, 112, 126, 140, 154 and 168. Data were analyzed using the PROC Mixed procedure of SAS. Average daily gain (ADG) of the foals was not influenced by the addition of yeast to the maternal diets. Hip height and wither height were highly correlated (r = 0.99). Although upper leg length and wither height were highly correlated (r = 0.93), lower leg length and wither height were not (r = 0.72). No significant differences in foal growth and development due to dietary yeast supplementation of the maternal diets were observed in this study.
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1st place in Agriculture and Environmental Sciences at the Ohio State University Denman Undergraduate Research Forum
Keywords
horse, yeast, growth, development, foal, supplementation