A preliminary evaluation on mixed probiotics as an antimicrobial spraying agent in growing pig barn

The purpose of this study is to examine whether spraying an anti-microbial agent into the slurry pit will reduce the noxious odor substances from piggery barns. For this, a total of 200 crossbred [(Landrace × Yorkshire) × Duroc] growing pigs with an initial average body weight (BW) of 23.58 ± 1.47 kg were selected and housed in two different rooms, i.e. control (CON) and treatment (TRT). Each room has 100 pigs (60 gilts and 40 borrows). For a period of 42 days, all pigs were fed with corn-soybean meal-based basal diet. Later the noxious odor substances were measured by the following methods. First, fecal samples were randomly collected and stored in sealed and unsealed containers, and sprayed with the non-anti-microbial agent (NAMA) (saline water) and multi-bacterial spraying (MBS) agent (200:1, mixing ratio-fecal sample: probiotic), Second, the slurry pit of CON and TRT rooms were directly sprayed with NAMA and MBS, respectively. The fecal sample that was stored in sealed and un-sealed containers and sprayed with MBS significantly reduced NH₃ and CO₂ concentration at the end of day 7. However, at the end of day 42, the fecal sample showed a lower H₂S, methyl mercaptans, acetic acid, and CO₂ concentration compared to the unsealed container. Moreover, at the end of days 7, 14, 21, 28, 35, and 42 compared to the CON room and TRT room slurry pit emits lower concentrations of NH₃, acetic acid, H₂S, and methyl mercaptans, and CO₂ into the atmosphere. Based on the current findings, we infer that spraying anti-microbial agents on pig dung would be one of the better approaches to suppress the odor emission from the barn in the future.