A total of 64 five-month-old Pietrain pigs were randomly allocated to 4 treatments with 4 replicates per treatment according to the body weight.The pigs were fed either a standard corn-soybean meal based control diet (treatments 1 and 2), the standard diet with 1% Lycium barbarum (LB) (treatment 3), or the standard diet with 1% Polygala tenuifolia Willd (PT) (treatment 4).Serum lactic acid and glucose concentrations were increased in stressed pigs (P < 0.05).Addition of the herbs in the diet had no effect on the serum lactic acid concentration, but 1% LB decreased (P < 0.05) serum glucose concentration in the stressed pigs.Pre-slaughter stress also decreased (P < 0.01) liver glycogen concentration and the decrease could be inhibited by addition of 1% LB in the diet (p > 0.05).Pre-slaughter stress increased the concentration of maleic dialdehyde (MDA) (P < 0.05) and decreased glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) activity in serum, while dietary 1% LB increased (p < 0.05) the activity of GSH-Px and decreased the concentration of MDA in the serum.In conclusion, pre-slaughter stress induces oxidative stress in pigs and dietary supplementation with 1% LB improves antioxidant capacity in stressed pigs before slaughtering.
Chinese medicinal herbs glycogen oxidative pig stress
Xiumei BAI Xue YAN Linqi XIE Xiaodong HU Xi LIN Changzheng WU Ningcong ZHOU Anru WANG Miles Todd SEE
State Key Laboratory of Direct-Fed Microbial Engineering, Beijing DaBeiNong Science and Technology G Beijing Feed Safety and Biological Control Engineering Research Center, Beijing 100192, China Department of Animal Science, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27695, USA Feed Research and Technology Center, Beijing DaBeiNong Science and Technology Group Company, Ltd.(DB Inner Mongolia Ulanqab Institute of Animal Husbandry Science, Ulanqab Inner Mongolia, 012000, China