Efficacy of the coadministration of coccidiocide and prebiotic to broiler chickens infected with Eimeria tenella oocysts

Abstract

Coccidiostatics are used in poultry farms to prevent and treat eimeriosis, and antibiotics are used to reduce pathogenic microflora, which negatively affects the gut microbiome of birds. In some poultry farms, probiotics are used to correct the gut microbiome of birds with eimeriosis. The use of prebiotics for this purpose has been little studied, although they can also serve as an alternative to antibiotic therapy. The work is devoted to studying the effect of combined and separate administration of chemical coccidiocide and lactulose-containing prebiotic to broilers on the intensity of eimeriosis invasion caused by Eimeria tenella, as well as on the number of mesophilic aerobic and facultative anaerobic microorganisms, including bacteria of the genus Bifidobacterium, Lactobacterium, Clostridium and Escherichia in cecum of 28-day-old broilers. The results showed that on average, for the entire period of the experiment, the lowest intensity of eimeriosis invasion was in the groups where coccidiocide and prebiotic were used: 17.50 ± 5.91 and 17.32 ± 5.67 thousand oocysts/g respectively. In the group where their combined purpose was, the intensity was 27.41 ± 8.13, which was slightly lower than in the infected control - 29.21 ± 8.70 thousand oocysts/g. The introduction of a prebiotic into the broiler diet allowed increasing the number of native bacteria of the genera Bifidobacterium and Lactobacterium, which reduced the number of opportunistic microorganisms such as Escherichia and Clostridium.