Article

Effects of maternal rumen microbiota on the development of the microbial communities in the gastrointestinal tracts of neonatal sika deer

Yan Zhang1,2, Shuang Liang3, Seongho Choi4,*, Guangyu Li1,**
Author Information & Copyright
1College of Animal Science and Technology, Qingdao Agricultural University, Qingdao 266109, China.
2College of Animal Science and Technology, Jilin Agricultural Science and Technology University, Jilin 132109, China.
3Department of Animal Science, College of Animal Sciences, Jilin University, Changchun 130062, China.
4Department of Animal Science, Chungbuk National University, Cheongju 28644, Korea.
*Corresponding Author: Seongho Choi, Department of Animal Science, Chungbuk National University, Cheongju 28644, Korea, Republic of. E-mail: seongho@cbnu.ac.kr.
**Corresponding Author: Guangyu Li, College of Animal Science and Technology, Qingdao Agricultural University, Qingdao 266109, China. E-mail: tcslgy@126.com.

© Copyright 2024 Korean Society of Animal Science and Technology. This is an Open-Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

This study investigated whether the microbial assemblages in the gastrointestinal tracts (GITs) of sika deer calves can be manipulated by maternal rumen microbiota transplantation (MRMT). The results suggest that MRMT had no significant effect on the growth of calves but markedly lowered the duration of diarrhea and increased rumen fermentation in sika deer calves. Sequencing analysis of 16S rRNA gene amplicons revealed that MRMT increased the ability of some microbial taxa to colonize the GIT or enabled the colonization of others, which caused the ruminal microbial communities in sika deer calves to shift such that they resembled those of their mothers and promoted the temporal development of gut microbial diversity in deer calves. Moreover, after inoculation, 7 inoculum-dominant taxa (<italic>Butyrivibrio</italic>, <italic>Tenericute</italic>,<italic> RFP12</italic>, <italic>SR1</italic>, <italic>Verrucomicrobia</italic>, <italic>Verruco-5</italic>, and <italic>WCHB1-4</italic>) and one inoculum-dominant taxon (<italic>Butyrivibrio)</italic> were significantly enriched in the rumen and feces of the sika deer calves, respectively. These data suggest that MRMT may be an effective approach for promoting microbial establishment in the GIT and preventing diarrhea in sika deer calves.

Keywords: Sika deer calf; Diarrhea; Early-life intervention; Maternal rumen microbiota transplantation; Microbial colonization