This study examined the effect of probiotics on growth and development in Chinese Holstein replacement cattle. Twenty-four newborn Holstein calves were randomly divided into 4 groups with 3 males and 3 females each. Calves were offered a basal diet including milk replacer, starter diet and Chinese wildrye （control diet, group A）, a basal diet supplemented with Bacillus licheniformis （group B）, a basal diet supplemented with Bacillus licheniformis and Bacillus subtilis （group C）, and a basal diet supplemented with Bacillus licheniformis, Bacillus subtilis and Lactobacillus plantarum （group D）, respectively. The ratio of each microbial strain for group C and group D was 1 ： 1 and 1：1：1 in the bacterial counts, respectively. Each calve was offered 2× 10^10 CFU of probiotics per day. The total trial period was 52 weeks.Body weight and body measurement were recorded every 4 weeks.The result showed that average daily gain of the cattle in group B was significantly higher than that of group A （P〈0.05） in the trial of 0-52 weeks. In the end of the trial, the body lenth of group B was higher than group A （P〈0.05）,and the weight of group B tended to be higher than group A （P=0.0865）. The probiotics did not affect the wither height and heart girth of dairy cattle of four groups （P〉0.05）. It was concluded that adding probiotics into the diet for dairy cattle could improve the growth and development.
ProbioticsReplacement cattleGrowth and development
NETL
NSTL
维普
万方数据
