This newsletter comes to you at what is hopefully the end of a period of high feed price ratios. It is unlikely that the price of feed will drop, but product prices are at last starting to move upwards.

Steve Kyriazis is now officially working for SPESFEED. Steve spent 6 months working on the farms at Kanhym and has just spent some time overseas. He has just about completed his MSc in pig nutrition at the University of Natal. He will be involved in the general nutritional aspects of SPESFEED but more specifically he will focus on the pig side of our business.

The dairy nutrition course that we had planned to hold together with Evans Johnson Associates had to be postponed as it clashed with a course on the CNCPS Model.

I have had a number of requests to run the poultry nutrition course on a part time basis. This I would be happy to do, provided that there is enough interest shown. I would envisage that we would meet for 6 sessions over a 6 week period. This could be either one evening during the week or on a Saturday morning.

Please let us know if you are interested in this.

We still have a number of copies of Leeson and Summers' book entitled Broiler Breeder Production, the price of which is R 500.00 excluding VAT.

Uninspired, tedious and painful presenting does not need to be by chance, it is a skill that can be learned.

1. Don't bother to research your audience. You don't want to find out anything, which might mean you have to alter your content.
2. Start off with an apology, "I'm not much of a speaker, "or," I haven't really had time to prepare properly."  This will give the audience an accurate indication of whether they should bother paying attention.
3. Read out the presentation from a typed script. Don't upset the audience by looking up and making eye contact. They want to see your bald patch, not your face.
4. Include a thick wedge of clichés. "Our people are our most important asset," or, "the only constant is change." Audiences love clichés. When they hear a cliché, they know that they don't have to listen to the rest of the presentation, because they will have heard it all before.
5. Use filler phrases and words like "um," err," and especially, "you know." Some really experienced presenters can say, "you know" several times a minute. Audiences don't like you to prepare a script in advance. These phrases make it sound as though you have dispensed with preparation completely.
6. The correct term is "slideshow," not "presentation." The slides are much more important than anything the presenter actually says. If you use enough slides, the audience may even forget that there is a presenter. The audience may not remember all 40 of your visuals, or indeed any of them. But after the presentation is finished, they should want to do business with your slides, not you.
7. Walk right up the center aisle towards the back of the room. This really demonstrates your confidence. You are so confident that you don't want the front half of the audience to see you. As you become less and less visible, your voice will take on a disembodied, divine quality, thus enhancing your god-like status as a presenter.
8. Take as long as possible to get to the point. Everyone in the audience has plenty of time to spare. They will enjoy the intellectual challenge of trying to work out where you are going. It is just plain rude to make your real meaning too clear too soon.
9. Time limits are for paranoid organizer-types, not you. If you are given a 20 minute slot at a conference, that really means 30-35 minutes. The speakers who are after you can adapt. It doesn't really matter whether the event finishes on time. There are always more planes and trains.
10. Finish with a quotation. The audience will then realize that George Bernard Shaw knew more about your products than you do.

In essence, AGP’s not only help to restore a productive homeostatic state, but more importantly, they often prevent disturbances from taking place, thus negating the need for subsequent therapeutic treaatments.

The purpose of this article is to show what steps we would need to take to manage our farms in the absence of AGP’s in our diets. I have read a number of very good papers on the topic in the last few months and I will include some of the key points in this short article.

Avoidance and Prevention

The key management tool that needs to be used to avoid a depression in production levels in the absence of AGP is to avoid and/or prevent infection.

This process begins with biosecurity and surveillance. Biosecurity is a thought process that must be instilled into all employees and strictly adhered to by management for the purpose of limiting endemic pathogen spread on the farm. The premise of biosecurity is to understand that people, rodents, vehicles, air and dust can act as vectors which transfer pathogens from one location to another. It is then essential to monitor pathogen status, which is a task that is now routinely performed by the consultant veterinarians in our industry.

In the case of poultry, sentinel birds raised by SPF companies are available to monitor pathogen presence and causative organisms associated with specific disease.

Management Techniques

Good management will go a long way to preventing the occurrence and spread of disease. In the case of pigs this would include the implementation of Segregated Early Weaning (SEW) and wean to finish production systems which are designed to limit endemic pathogen spread. The concept of multi-site production for the purpose of disease eradication was introduced by Alexander (1980). The main premise for the success of this production system is that young pigs (< 21 days of age) are separated from sows in order to avoid pathogen spread from sows at a time when pigs are not old enough to actively protect themselves from the pathogens present in sow feces, but still have circulating colostral antibody protection.

Streaming is a process designed to contain disease on a single unit and reduce the effect of disease in healthy pigs. It creates a farm environment where a treated, sick pig never returns to the pen where it originated. These treated, sick pigs remain with other once- sick, but recovered pigs until slaughter, usually in cheaper housing on another site.

Pen size and stocking densities have an impact on the general health status of all intensively housed animals, and in all likelihood these would need to be reduced should AGP’s be withdrawn.

Nutritional Strategies

Nutritional management in the absence of AGP’s will place a greater demand upon the nutritionist to design economical feeding programs to help nullify any health challenges experienced. These programs will focus on:

Nutritional modulation of the immune system, in the absence of AGP’s, will require a re-evaluation of the nutrient requirements for all stages of growth, for protein and amino acid requirements, energy demands and sources, mineral and vitamin fortifications, and the value of dietary fiber. To date, these requirements have been determined in diets containing therapeutic or subtherapeutic levels of antimicrobials.

There are a number of "alternative" products to AGP’s on the market. These include prebiotics, probiotics, acidifiers, enzymes, and herbal extracts. It is beyond the scope of this article to deal with these in detail. It can only be suggested that they be properly screened and evaluated before use.

I firmly believe that AGP’s will not always be available to us. Nutrition and feeding strategies must supplement, not be a substitute for, good management. Sound nutrition principles and feeding of diets with appropriate quantities and ratios of nutrients are essential for the maintenance of health and promotion of a strong immune system. Adequate nutritional supplementation will further allow the animal to take full advantage of the benefits afforded by other additives.

This article was based on work by Kelin-Hessling, 2000, Lawrence & Hahn, 2001 and Fangman 2001. The complete documents are available from SPESFEED.

Temperature is the most critical concern during incubation. The embryo is sensitive to small changes in temperature, which can have an important long-term effect. Embryos from the modern lines of broiler also generate more heat than the embryo from a few years ago.

In addition, egg size and the number of eggs set per machine have increased in recent years, these larger eggs, with larger embryos have relatively less surface area to egg volume and embryo size, making heat loss more difficult. The other aspect of larger eggs is that it becomes increasingly more difficult to ensure that air is circulating adequately in the incubator,and therefore between the eggs.

The role of embryo temperature during incubation is perhaps more important than some may realise. Assessing and controlling the environment within every aspect of the hatchery is vital to successful control of embryo temperature.

Temperatures may for various reasons, deviate from the ideal. Incubation temperatures that are too high result in generally poor hatchability increased incidence of malformed chicks and excessive late embryonic mortality. The following are some signs that the embryo was probably overheated during development:

Some excellent photographs of some of these symptoms are available but we are unable to reproduce them here.  To overcome this problem, routine temperature checks are needed. It is recommended that the accuracy of the setter and hatcher thermometers be checked with an accurate thermometer. Embryo temperature can also be controlled through management. This includes not placing too many eggs in the incubator as well as monitoring and adjusting machine set points, speed of airflow, room temperature and humidity using the internal egg temperature as a indicator of what is required. Digital infrared thermometers can be used to monitor the internal temperature of the egg, although they are usually used to measure human body temperature in the ear canal. This is an easy and relatively cheap way to assess what is happening in the incubator and such simple measurements are a valuable tool in ensuring good chick quality.

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A paper on organic pork production was recently published by workers in Minnesota in the US. We have included some extracts from this paper for your interest.

There are extensive standards for organic production of pork. Several international and national groups have offered definitions for organic agriculture. Those definitions speak of environmental, social, and ethical goals and principles. Organic livestock production is defined and structured as part of the whole farm ecosystem. The National Standards for Organic Agriculture published by the Canadian General Standards Board speaks of livestock production as follows:

"Provide attentive care that promotes the health and meets the behavioural needs of livestock. Organically raised livestock are managed to prevent disease and promote wellness through a combination of organically-produced diet, adequate housing, ethical animal husbandry, handling practices that minimize stress, and regular monitoring."

United States National Organic Standards were announced by the USDA on December 20, 2000. The U.S. National Organic Standards are available on the National Organic Program website at www.ams.usda.gov/nop/ linked from the United States Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Marketing Service. Feed manufactured for use in organic pork production can only contain ingredients from three categories:

1. Agricultural products that were produced and handled organically,
2. Non-synthetic substances such as enzymes, probiotics, and others usually thought of as natural ingredients, and
3. Synthetic substances that appear on the national list of Synthetic Substances Allowed for Use in Organic Livestock Production.

Some ingredient limitations for organic diets include:

Some of the ingredients, both synthetic and non-synthetic that are allowed to be used are as follows:

Organically produced pork must carry the USDA seal for organic products to be sold as organic pork. A third party must certify that feeding and production requirements listed in the U.S.

National Organic Standards were followed to allow pork to carry the USDA seal.

Although the use of antibiotics or drugs is not allowed in animals that are sold to organic markets, this does not suggest that animal welfare be ignored if animals become sick or in need of medication. In fact, the National Standards on Organic Agricultural Production and Handling (2000) establish that a producer of organic livestock must administer vaccines and other veterinary biologics as needed to protect the well-being of animals in his or her care. The producer must not withhold medical treatment from a sick animal to maintain its organic status. All appropriate medications and treatments must be used to restore an animal to health when methods acceptable to organic production standards fail. Livestock that are treated with prohibited materials must be clearly identified and shall not be sold, labelled, or represented as organic.

Corn-soybean meal based diets are typically used in midwestern pork production and similar formulations are being used for organic production with organically-produced corn and soybean meal (mechanically extracted). However, the high cost and limited availability of organically-produced corn and soybean meal may preclude their use, and alternatives will have to be sought. These may include pasture as a feed source.

The economic climate in South Africa has undergone momentous changes in the last year with the Rand, seemingly, on a never-ending downward spiral. This unprecedented devaluation caused the sudden increase in maize prices that shocked the agricultural community in late November last year. Only recently has the currency recovered slightly and, with the harvest, has caused the maize prices to start stabilizing. Maize was not the only raw material to be effected by the devaluation, but seeing as maize contributes the most, by volume, to animal feeds it caused the prices to climb to astronomic proportions. This, aided by a slump in product markets has decreased feed margins and all but driven the last nail into the animal producer’s coffin. Suffice to say its getting tough!!!

As the market prices of meat cannot be relied upon to alter margins, the answer would appear to be to make use of alternative cereal grains and by products such as wheat, barley, oats, molasses meal and sorghum to replace some of the maize in their diets. All of these can be added to various diets within the production system, and at inclusion rates that can significantly decrease the cost of a particular diet (thus improving margins). Although the reduced cost of some of these ingredients might be tempting, there are some nutritional factors that, in order to maintain efficiency of production, must be taken into consideration before these alternatives are tried.

The price of wheat, when available, tends run parallel with that of maize. The product also tends to be quite variable, as is the case with most ingredients, and should therefore be inspected thoroughly before being used. The protein content of wheat is higher, on average, (10.3% CP) than that of maize (8% CP), as well as being high in lysine content. Wheat is suitable for inclusion in any pig diet.

Barley is another good cereal grain that is used in many parts of the world as the sole cereal grain in pig feeds from the grower phase through to the various breeding herd rations. The drawback of barley is that it has a relatively high fiber content due to the presence of the hull, or husk. This fraction of the barley’s carbohydrate make-up is virtually indigestible to young and growing pigs, limiting its inclusion weaner diets and excluding its use in creep feeds, unless one makes use of artificial enzymes at extra cost. For the same reason barley inclusion (or any other alternative cereal with a higher fiber content than maize) in poultry diets, especially broiler diets, can only happen on a very limited basis (approx. 10%). In the hulless form, however, the digestibility improves somewhat and compares quite favourably to maize. It is ideal for dry sow rations, sow & boar rations, and lactation diets due to the better hind-gut fermentation the older animals are capable of.

Oats is also problematic in terms of fiber content. It use is therefore also limited to the breeding stock diets (only dry sow/boar rations). Growing pigs struggle to take in enough energy even on maize based (energy dense) diets, the added bulkiness if fiber decreases the energy density and thus compounds the problem of low energy intake. The processing of oats is very important. Oats contains certain fat-digesting enzymes that, in the grain’s natural form, are separated from the fat fraction. If the grain if processed too early before incorporation into feeds, the incidence of rancidity is greatly increased.

Sorghum is another source of highly digestible carbohydrate. The protein content is also a bit higher (9.5-19% CP) than that of maize. The presence of tannins, bred in certain cultivars to help prevent losses due to wild birds, decreases the nutritive value of grain-sorghum and is the obvious reason why it is not included in poultry feeds. The tannins reduce the digestibility of both energy and protein quite markedly, but the tannin free cultivars are very good to use in animal feeds provided the inclusion rate is closely monitored.

Although molasses meal is not a product that would make up a huge percentage of ones feed, it is a useful ingredient to use in modest amounts, especially in pig diets. The reason is one of palatability. There is a marked increase in feed intake when it is included at a rate of about 5% of the total volume. Increased feed intake is a valuable improvement when it comes to growing and lactating animals. It is cheap, but is difficult to handle and mix into the feeds. It also has a laxative effect, which is useful when sows are suffering from constipation. The use of alternative sources of carbohydrate has become more important in the light of escalating maize prices. Their use is, however, only possible if the characteristics of the various sources are taken into consideration when formulating feeds.

In the last edition of the SPESFEED News we carried part of Dr Mario Penz’s article that was presented at the 4^th NuTec Poultry Symposium. In this edition, I will include some of the comments and results that Dr Penz presented relating to pelleted broiler feed.

Bolton (1960) attributed the improvement in performance of broilers fed pelleted diets to hyperphagia. These data are consistent with those obtained by Klein et al. (1995) and other workers. However, Jensen et al. (1962) asserted that pelleting does not interfere in the amount of feed consumed, instead, it decreases the duration of feed intake, and, consequently, the energy spent for consumption, leaving more energy available for growth. Moran (1987) discussed that another advantage of pelleting is an increase in nutrient digestibility due to mechanical processing and to the action of temperature. Carbohydrate digestibility improves because amylosis and amylo-pectin are organized in granules, and the heat treatment disorganizes these granules, making the action of enzymes easier. Pelleting also partially hydrolizes proteins changing their natural structures and releasing several nutrients by breaking down cell walls. However, excessive temperature during pelleting may impair lysine availability. According to the same author, another advantage of pelleting is that birds prefer to ingest particles which size is a little smaller than the mouth cavity.

Klein et al. (1995) studied the effect of the physical form of the diet (pelleted or mash) on energy metabolism responses of 21 to 42-day-old broilers. Using comparative slaughter technique, the authors found that pelleting favored (P<0.05) feed intake, energy retention and the efficiency of retention of apparent metabolizable energy (AME). This increase in energy retention caused by pelleting did not affect daily protein retention (P>0.05), but significantly affected crude fat retention (P<0.05). Therefore, in birds fed pelleted diets, the percentage of crude energy retained as protein decreased, and as crude fat increased (Table 1).

These observations are consistent with literature data demonstrating that birds fed pelleted diets tend to have higher fat deposition, and consequently, lower protein accretion.

The use of pelleted diets may be an alternative to increase feed intake and consequently the performance of broilers submitted to high environmental temperatures. Howlider et al. showed that pelleting a low energy (ME) diet promoted the same weight gain in males and females as those shown by increasing the ME of mash diets when the environmental temperature was close to the thermal comfort zone of the birds. Under high environmental temperature, the effect of pelleting was more marked. Independent of the environmental temperature, ME intake/kg of weight gain for each type of diet and sex of bird did not change. Interestingly, pelleting decreased ME intake values/kg of weight gain when compared to the intake of birds fed mash diets with same or different ME content (Table 2).

The improved efficiency in ME utilization makes pelleting an interesting alternative, even in hot weather, when some nutritionist tend to increase dietary ME to increase the inclusion of fat in order to decrease heat production.