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Prairie Swine Centre is an affiliate of the University of Saskatchewan
Prairie Swine Centre is grateful for the assistance of the George Morris Centre in developing the economics portion of Pork Insight.
Financial support for the Enterprise Model Project and Pork Insight has been provided by:
A model for fossil energy use in Danish agriculture used to compare organic and conventional farming
Posted in: Environment by admin on January 1, 2001 | No Comments
Nutriotnal Strategies to Recue Hog Odours
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Manure is primarily a mixture of urine and faeces excreted from pigs that contains undigested dietary compoenets, endogenous end products, excreted excees absorbed nutrients, and indigenous bacteria from the lower gastrointestinal tract of the pig. Manure contains a variety of organic cpmpounds complex to simple in nature, inorganic compounds, and potentially feed additives depending on the makeup of the diet. Pig faeces and urine both contain considerabvle amounts of nitrogen, phosphorus, and other minerals such as calcium, and magnesium. Fecal nitrogen arises from undigested dietary protein, intestinal secretions, sloughed intestinal cells and intestinal bacteria. Urinary nitrogen largely in the form of urea, arises from the breakdown of absorbed dietary amiono acids that are in excess of the amounts needed for lean protein synthesis, and from the normal breakdown of body tissue products.
Numerous compounds have been identified from the anaerobic degradation of livestock manure. Hey have been generally grouped as volatile amines, sulfides, disulfides, orhanic acids, phenols, and more. But more recent analysis have identified 15 specific volatile organic compounds as primaryodour causing compounds from manure. The sensitivity of individul compounds by olfactory threshold detectionvaries widely. In general sulfur-containing compounds are among the group of lowest detection thresholds from manure. A major challenge in identifying specific odourous compounds from manure is that analytically derived gas concentrations and olfactometry are not highly related. Moreover there are confounding effects of mixtures of different compounds on olfactometry detection. Some volatile organic compunds have change chemical form, hus, precise analytical detection and quantification of air samples is also a challenge.
The Risks for Disease transmission from Hog Manure
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Introduction
Fecal wastes from domestic animals, wildlife and humans are applied to the soil surface and to varying extents are incorporated into the soil. These fecal wastes can also enter water systems by direct contamination of the water or through seepage or surface runoff. Humans contaminate water sources through poorly processed sewage effluents, malfunctioning septic tanks and seepage from sanitary landfills. Domestic and wild animals contaminate water by defecation in
unprotected surface water, through runoff and as a result of seepage of water through soil that contains an excessive amount of animal feces. A wide variety of pathogenic viruses, bacteria and parasites may be found in the feces of wild and domestic animals and humans. Also, nonpathogenic bacteria and parasites are found in large numbers in the feces of animals as well as soil and water. Only a small number of animal pathogens in feces, water and soil have the potential to infect humans and domestic animals (Table 1). These are the pathogens that are of great concern to the public, who are usually exposed to these animal pathogens through consumption of fecal contaminated food or water. Concentration of wildlife is also a potential source of water and soil contamination. Some types of wildlife congregate in herds and flocks and can contribute to extensive pathogen contamination to the water and soil in certain location and times of the year. Bacterial, parasitic and viral pathogens in human fecal waste have the greatest potential to cause infection in other humans. Raw sewage is processed to varying degrees before it is distributed on soil or discharged into water systems. Failure to appropriately process human sewage probably poses the greatest threat to human health however it is often impossible to identify sources of
food and water contamination. Animal feces may contain pathogens infectious to both humans and animals. As a result food animals are incriminated in many waterborne and foodborne outbreaks. It is critical for human health, animal health and agriculture sustainability reasons that water and food supplies be protected from contamination by animal feces.
Phosphorus Accumulation in Cultivated Soils from Long Term Animal Applications of Cattle Feedlot Manure
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Historically, manure has been recognized as an excellent soil amendment that can improve soil quality and provide nutrients for cop production. In areas of high animal denisty, howver the potentail for water pollution resulting from improper storage or disposal may be significant. The objective of this tudy was to determine the P balance of cultivated soils under barley production that has received long term annual manure amendments. Non-irrigated soils ta the study site in Lethbridge, Alberta have recived 0, 30, 60 or 90 Mg manure per hectare while irrigated plots received 0,60,120, and 180 Mg per hectare annually for 16 years. The amoount of P removed in the barley grain and straw during the 16 year period was between 5-18% of the cumulative manure applied. There was a balance between P applied in the manure and P removed from the crops and soils of non-irrigated plots during the 16 year study period. In irrigated plots, as much as 1.4 Mg P per hectare added was not recovered over 16 years, and was probably lost due to leaching. The risk of ground water contamination with P from manure was higher with iirigated soils than irrigated plots that have recived long-term manure amendments. Manure application rates should be reduced in non-irrigated plots to more closely mantch P inputs to match crop P requirements.
Diet Composition Affects Odor Characteristics from Swine Manure
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Ten diets were formulated to contain a variety of feedstuffs that were expected to alter swine manure characteristics and therefore odor emissions. Odour characteristics of manure were assessed by means of a human odour panel. Diets containing fishmeal and high levels of sulfur had the most unpleasant odours, while high fiber and purified diets had the least unpleasant. Manure samples from swine fed the diets containing 1% garlic powder and fishmeal were perceived as most irritating while high fiber and purified diets were again the least irritating.
Results from this preliminary study illustrate that altering diet composition has potential as an odour abatement strategy. However, more quantitative research pertaining to the effect of diet composition on odour-specific microbes inhabiting the intestinal tract of swine is needed to determine the extent of its practical application.
CHANGING THE ENVIRONMENT IN SWINE BUILDINGS USING SULFURIC ACID
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Tracing the Source of E. coli Fecal Contamination of Water Using rep-PCR
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Recently the bacterium Escherichia coli (E. coli) has been prominently featured in the news due to sickness caused by E. coli water contamination. Bacterial drinking water contamination may have a detrimental effect on the expansion of the livestock industry. Thus techniques which could trace E. coli water contamination to its source are needed. Genetic fingerprinting is one such technique. The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is used to amplify fragments of the E. coli DNA. These fragments are visualized on a gel in the form of a series of bands much like a bar code. Each bar code is unique to one particular strain of E. coli. However barcodes from E. coli strains all isolated from one species of animal (pigs or chickens or cows) may be more similar to each other than are barcodes from E. coli which came from different kinds of animals. Thus possible contamination could be traced back to its source. With the support of the MLMMI we isolated and identified 91 E. coli strains from pigs, cattle, and chickens living on Manitoban farms and from humans. Each E. coli strain was fingerprinted using rep-PCR. This is a variation of fingerprinting making use of repeating sequences in the DNA of E. coli to start PCR. The fingerprints were converted into a series of 1 and 0; 1 for the presence of a band and 0 for its absence. This allowed comparison of fingerprints using statistical analysis. We found that the fingerprints of the 91 E. coli strains were quite different from each other. No groups of E. coli fingerprints corresponded to a particular animal. It appears that in Manitoba livestock and in the human population there is a wide variety of E. coli genetic types. We have not yet found genetic types of E. coli specific to any variety of livestock animal. E. coli is ubiquitous in the mammalian intestinal tract and may move from animal to animal and species to species. Further investigation with other methods of determining which animal group a specific E. coli isolate came from is underway.
Economic and environmental threats of alien plant, animal, and microbe invasions
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