EFFECTS OF VARYING DIETARY CHINESE HERB EXTRACTION ON BLOOD IMMUNE STATUS AND ANTIOXIDANT FUNCTION IN DAIRY CATTLE - C. Zhang; G. Zhao (Journal of Animal and Plant Sciences, 2022)
Chinese herbs of Astragalus and eucommia have shown the function of raising body immunity and antioxidant in animal production. The current experiment was aimed to study the effects of varying dietary supplemental two Chinese herb extracts (CHEs) on blood immune status and antioxidant function in dairy cattle. CHEs is the mixture of 40% Astragalus extract and 60% eucommia extract. Forty Holstein dairy cattle were randomly assigned to four treatments of each treatment ten animals, included: (1) NC (basal diet), (2) T1 (NC+400mg/kg CHEs), (3) T2 (NC+600mg/kg CHEs), and T3 (NC+1000mg/kg CHEs). Supplemental CHEs enhanced the blood immunity (P<0.05) with higher concentrations of immunoglobulin (Ig) G, IgM, interleukin (IL)-2, IL-4, a higher proportion of CD4 (T1 treatment), CD8 and ratio of CD4/CD8 (T1 and T2 treatments) and lower content of IL-6. Compared with the NC treatment, dairy cattle in T1, T2 and T3 treatments had higher (P<0.05) enzyme activities of glutathione-peroxidase (934, 798, 779 vs 765U/mL) and superoxide dismutase (86.1, 75.3, 81.7 vs 72.5U/mL), lower (P<0.05) content of malondialdehyde (2.24, 3.55, 3.34 vs 5.64nmol/mL). Collectively, supplemental dietary CHEs at the levels of 400 and 600mg/kg dry matter of concentrate in dairy cattle improved blood immune status and enhanced their antioxidant function. These findings suggested that dietary inclusion of CHEs may be favorable for dairy cattle production.
Keywords: journal article; Antioxidant function; dairy cattle; herb; immunity