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Health and Growth of Veal Calves Fed Milk Replacers With or Without Probiotics

¹ Department of Nutrition, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Utrecht University, 3508 TD Utrecht, The Netherlands
² Research and Development Department, Winclove Bio Industries B.V. Amsterdam, The Netherlands
³ Research and Development Department, VanDrie Group, Mijdrecht, The Netherlands
⁴ Research and Development Department, Sloten B.V., Deventer, The Netherlands
⁵ Laboratory of Food Microbiology, Department of Agrotechnology and Food Sciences, Wageningen University, Wageningen, The Netherlands

Corresponding author: H. Timmerman; e-mail: h.timmerman{at}vet.uu.nl.

Four experiments with 1-wk-old veal calves were conducted to assess the influence of probiotics on growth and health indicators. In experiments 1 and 2, the liquid probiotic supplements were administered daily from experimental d 1 to 15. The treatment period in experiments 3 and 4 was extended to 56 d. The probiotics used were a multispecies probiotic (MSPB) containing different probiotic species of human origin, or a calf-specific probiotic (CSPB) containing 6 Lactobacillus species isolated from calf feces and selected on the basis of a combination of characteristics.

When the data for the 4 experiments were pooled, the probiotics enhanced growth rate during the first 2 wk. During the 8-wk experimental period, average daily gain and feed efficiency were significantly improved in the probiotic-treated groups. The MSPB-induced increase in weight gain was greater when the control calves were considered less healthy based on a health score (an index of diarrhea and therapeutic treatments). Probiotic treatment tended to diminish mortality. The CSPB treatment reduced the incidence of diarrhea and the fecal counts of coliforms. When therapeutic treatment was intensive in the control calves, the ingestion of probiotics reduced the percentage of calves that required therapy and the amount of treatments needed against digestive or respiratory diseases. There was no clear difference in the efficiency of the MSPB and CSPB preparations. Further research is necessary to identify underlying mechanisms and to evaluate the potential of probiotics to improve respiratory health in veal calf production.

Key Words: veal calves • probiotics • growth performance • animal health

Abbreviation key: ADG = average daily gain, CSPB = calf-specific probiotic, FE = feed efficiency, GHS = general health score, LAMVAB = Lactobacillus anaerobic MRS agar with vancomycin and bromocresol green, MRS = de Man, Rogosa, and Sharpe, MSPB = multispecies probiotic.

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