Dietary AFETOXIN-BD supplementation mitigates multi-mycotoxin effects on performance, egg quality, and health status of late-laying hens.

Mycotoxins in poultry feed remain a major challenge to laying hen productivity, mainly in the late laying period when hens are at a higher risk of oxidative stress, compromised gut integrity and reduced reproductive performance. The efficacy of a commercial mycotoxin degrading preparation (AFETOXIN-BD) in reducing the negative impact of multi-mycotoxin contaminated feeds was evaluated. Two hundred 54-week-old Hy-Line Brown laying hens were randomly allotted to four dietary treatments (5 replicates of 10 hens) and fed for 35 days: a control diet (CON), a mycotoxin-contaminated diet (MT), CON plus 1,000 g/ton AFETOXIN-BD (BD), or MT plus 1,000 g/ton AFETOXIN-BD (MT+BD). The MT diet significantly (P < 0.05) reduced egg production rate, daily egg mass, eggshell strength, Haugh unit, antioxidant enzyme activities (T-SOD, GSH-Px, T-AOC), beneficial lactic acid bacteria populations and general health status of the hens, while increasing (P < 0.05) the feed-to-egg ratio, malondialdehyde (MDA) content, pathogenic bacteria counts (E. coli and Salmonella spp.), and the presence of mycotoxin residues in the eggs. Adverse effects were effectively mitigated (P < 0.05) in the MT+BD diet, while the BD diet exhibited better performance than the CON diet. Hens fed with BD diet showed (P < 0.05) superior production, egg quality, antioxidant activity, and intestinal microbial balance compared to all dietary treatments. From these results, it can be concluded that 0.1% AFETOXIN-BD supplementation is an effective nutritional intervention to mitigate the toxicity of multi-mycotoxin including AFB1, ZEN, FB1, OTA, and DON toxicity and improve productive efficiency, egg quality, and food safety in late-phase laying hens under commercial conditions, while also prolonging the productive lifespan.