Total nutrition : feeding animals for health and growth

Total Nutrition is the strategic use of a wide variety of disease avoidance and health maintenance measures which will contribute to an improved and more acceptable system of animal production, without the use of antibiotics. This volume considers the practical implications and implementation of the principles and theories laid out in Nutricines. In many countries there is now great resistance to the widespread use of antibiotic growth promoters and of other pharmaceutical products in raising animals for food. Unfortunately, there is frequently little appreciation by the population at large and by the media of the challenges this poses to the production of large volumes of low cost food of animal origin. The concept of this book, outlined here, may help to meet these challenges where health maintenance, disease avoidance and general nutrition are seen as requirements of animal diets today. This requires the consideration of both the nutrient levels of feeds and of the other bioactive components, known as nutricines. Initial results suggest that by judicious use of a range of nutricines, it will be possible to achieve both good health status of animals and good growth performance using feed formulations and ingredients that satisfy modern legislative and consumer demands.

Problems of perception. Virtues of cleanliness. Eating to live. Raw material processing. Struggle for supremacy. External enemies. The enemy within. Monitoring performance. Difficult demands. Index.