Can we dispense with the probiotics?
The intense poultry production puts the birds into the extremely hard conditions: composition of the diets is aimed at the highest productivity level; the feed are contaminated with pathogens and their toxins; large flocks are concentrated in relatively small productive areas. All these factors can disturb the delicate balance of the intestinal microbiota, induce the diseases in poultry, deteriorate the productive performance, induce massive mortality, deteriorate the safety of the products. Certain diseases can be passed to poultry via infected feeds. The investigation of in-feed microbiota performed by BIOTROF, Ltd., using the new generation sequencing (NGS) technique revealed that the outbreak of gastroenterites in a poultry farm was related to the contamination of feeds with certain hazardous pathogens: Pasteurellas (4.64%), Fusobacteria, and Staphylococci. It was found that these pathogens can accumulate and circulate at the farm via the chain “water and feeds - birds’ intestines - litter material”. Another problem disturbing the microbiota in chicken and inducing different pathologies is the contamination of feeds with mycotoxins. It is known that the gastrointestinal microbiota in poultry embryos is a basis for subsequent formation of “starting” intestinal microbial population at the hatch of chicks. On the example of probiotic Profort (BIOTROF, Ltd., Russia) authors showed that the use of probiotics in diets for poultry is cost-effective since these additives can substantially increase the production of poultry meat and the profitability of meat production.