Indigenous Lactobacillus strains improve growth performance and high density cholesterol levels in broilers

Antibiotics have been used extensively in poultry chicken to promote growth rate, increase feed conversion efficiency, and prevent intestinal infections, resulting in an imbalance of the beneficial intestinal flora. The use of lactic acid bacteria as feed additives to substitute antibiotic associated growth stimulators as well as their impact on meat quality, could possibly be the major approach. In this context, here, we studied two Lactobacillus cultures viz., L. plantarum KGL3A and L. fermentum KGL4 as an alternative to growth promoters. Broilers were grouped into four different treatments: T1 (control: basal diet + antibiotic growth promoter and immunomodulatory factor), T2 [basal diet without having antibiotic growth promoter and immunomodulatory factor + L. plantarum KGL3A (108 CFU/mL)], T3 [basal diet without having antibiotic growth promoter and immunomodulatory factor + L. fermentum KGL4 (108 CFU/mL)] and T4 (basal diet without having antibiotic growth promoter and immunomodulatory factor + combination of T3 and T4 bacterial strains). During the entire study, higher bodyweight was observed among the Lactobacillus fed broilers groups (T4: 2433g, T3: 2371 g, T2: 2355 g) as compared to the control group (T1: 2339 g). Lipid profile analysis further confirmed the significant decrease in low-density lipoprotein (LDL) content of T4 (19%) and T3 (16%) groups than the control group while more than 10% increase in high-density lipoprotein HDL content was observed in T4 and T3 groups than the control group. Further, the decrease in coliform and enterococci counts and an increase in Lactobacillus counts in treatment groups compared to the control group were found. The results indicate that the potential use of Lactobacillus cultures (KGL3A and KGL4) as dietary feed supplements as alternative to the antibiotics as growth promoters in poultry feeds