Supplementation of exogenous β-mannanase to low protein diets improved feed conversion efficiency in lactating dairy cows.
In dairy production systems, feed constitutes the greatest cost and profitability of the operation depends on managing the inputs into the system.
Improving feed conversion efficiency (FCE) not only enhances the viability of a dairy operation but it also reduces excess nutrient excretion into the environment.
Although exogenous enzymes have been used routinely in nonruminants to improve nutrient utilization, their use in dairy diets has been limited mainly due to concerns that such enzymes would be ineffective due to hydrolysis in the rumen (Adesogan, 2005).
However, ruminant diets typically contain relatively greater amounts of forages which contain 70-80% as insoluble cell wall (Van Soest, 1994). This has the potential to be digested through enzymatic activity.
In addition, the dairy industry continues to integrate plant based by-products as part of the animals’ diet to reduce cost, which increases the potentially enzymatically degradable fiber content of the diet.
Fibrolytic enzymes such as β-mannanase hydrolyze non-starch polysaccharides in plant cell walls by targeting plant cell walls.
The polysaccharide β-mannan is an important component of the plant cell walls and includes pure mannan, glucomannan, galactomannan, and galactoglucomannan (Moreira and Filho, 2008).
Several studies have investigated the effectiveness of β-mannanase as an exogenous enzyme supplemented in livestock diets.
In nonruminants increases in digestibility of minerals, CP and OM has been reported through reduction of digesta viscosity and increased enzymatic activity in the intestine in swine (Lv et al., 2013).
Supplementation of β-mannanase in broilers was reported to increase FCE, and mitigated ileal viscosity (Lee et al., 2003).
There has been relatively little research conducted on the efficacy of β-mannanase in ruminants.
Supplementation of exogenous β-mannanase increased overall growth, FCE, and nitrogen (N) utilization in goats (Lee et al., 2014) and increased average daily gain in growing beef heifers (Seo et al., 2016).
Tewoldebrahan et al. (2017) investigated the effects of exogenous β-mannanase in dairy cattle fed corn silage and alfalfa hay-based diet. The authors reported that cows receiving β-mannanase increased milk yield per unit of DMI and milk protein yield per kilogram of CP. They also reported that ...
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