Occurrence of Aflatoxin B1 Producing Fungi in Finished Commercial Broiler Feed in Quetta

In poultry aflatoxins not only impairs weight gain, feed intake, feed conversion efficiency and egg production (Ortatatli et al., 2005; Muhammad et al., 2010) but also increases the susceptibility to environmental stress (Allameh et al., 2005) and severity of diseases like crop mycosis, salmonellosis, coccidiosis, aspergillosis and Marek's disease (Ibrahim et al., 2000). Season TI AF Aft IF% on the IF% on the IF% on the IF% on the basis of AF basis of TI basis of SS basis of TS Summer 37 11 5 45.5 13.5 20.8 5.2 Autumn 45 16 9 56.3 20.0 37.5 9.4 Winter 28 7 3 42.9 10.7 12.5 3.1 Spring 32 9 4 44.4 12.5 16.7 4.2 Overall 142 43 21 48.8 14.8 21.9 DISCUSSION Fungal contamination of poultry feed especially A. flavus is undesirable as the inhaling of spores may cause aspergillosis to the exposed community whereas, high level of fungi can affect palatability, reduce nutrient adsorption and may result in caking of feed. Abiotic factors like geographical area (Dersjant-Li et al., 2003), moisture level and pH value of substrate, oxygen to carbon dioxide ratio (O2:CO2), ambient temperature, relative humidity of the atmosphere, incubation time, light, type and quality of raw material used to formulate feed (Magnoli et al., 1998; Thompson and Henke, 2000; Tabuc and Stefan, 2005) and storage conditions (Azarkakhsh et al., 2011) considerably affect proliferation and prevalence of fungi. Sub-sequel risks and losses of fungal contamination and propagation in poultry feed or feed stuff might be limited by controlling both abiotic and biotic factors either in the field, during storage, processing and transportation. [...]improved pre- and post-harvest practices, strict hygiene during storage processing and transportation, periodic surveillance of poultry feed and feed stuff regarding fungi and fungal toxins should be adopted in order to lessen the risk of aflatoxicosis, enhance poultry production, and to build future strategies.