Indian Journal of Animal Research

An attempt was made to study the effect of supplementation of Lactobacillus acidophillus and Saccharomyces cerevisiac individually and combination of both to feed, on growth performance and feed conversion efficiency in goats. Sixteen of similar age and body weight were randomly allotted to four treatments viz, T₀: concentrate (without probiotics), T₁: 2gm Lactobacillus acidophillus per kg feed, T₂: 2gm Saccharomyces Cerevisiac per kg feed, and T₃: mixture of 1g Lactobacillus acidophillus + 1g Saccharomyces cerevisiac per kg feed was fed to the Osmanabadi goats. Observations on the body weight gain showed the significant (P<0.05) differences among the treatments means. The kids fed under treatment T₃ showed higher average daily weight gain (88 gm) over the other treatments, whereas the lowest average daily weight gain was recorded under treatment T₀ i.e. control group (26 gm). The mixture of probiotics (T₃) was found most effective in reducing the feed requirement, which was only 2.96 kg of weight gain. It is concluded that the use of probiotics either single or in combination was useful for higher weight gain in goats.