Impacts of cereal ergot in food animal production
Impacts of cereal ergot in food animal production
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Full item details
- creativework.keywords - en
- Ergot alkaloids
- creativework.keywords - fr
- Alcaloïdes de l'ergot de seigle
- dc.contributor.author
- Coufal-Majewski, Stephanie
- Stanford, Kim
- McAllister, Tim
- Blakley, Barry
- McKinnon, John
- Chaves, Alexandre Vieira
- Wang, Yuxi
- dc.date.accepted
- 2016-02-09
- dc.date.accessioned
- 2025-11-26T18:06:33Z
- dc.date.available
- 2025-11-26T18:06:33Z
- dc.date.issued
- 2016-02-25
- dc.date.submitted
- 2015-12-17
- dc.description.abstract - en
- The negative impacts of ergot contamination of grain on the health of humans and animals were first documented during the 5th century AD. Although ergotism is now rare in humans, cleaning contaminated grain concentrates ergot bodies in screenings which are used as livestock feed. Ergot is found worldwide, with even low concentrations of alkaloids in the diet (<100 ppb total) reducing the growth efficiency of livestock. Extended periods of increased moisture and cold during flowering promote the development of ergot in cereal crops. Furthermore, the unpredictability of climate change may have detrimental impacts to important cereal crops such as wheat, barley and rye, favouring ergot production. Allowable limits for ergot in livestock feed are confusing as they may be determined by proportions of ergot bodies or by total levels of alkaloids, measurements which may differ widely in their estimation of toxicity. The proportion of individual alkaloids including ergotamine, ergocristine, ergosine, ergocornine and ergocryptine is extremely variable within ergot bodies and the relative toxicity of these alkaloids has yet to be determined. This raises concerns that current recommendations on safe levels of ergot in feeds may be unreliable. Furthermore, the total ergot alkaloid content is greatly dependent on the geographic region, harvest year, cereal species, variety and genotype. Considerable animal to animal variation in the ability of the liver to detoxify ergot alkaloids also exists and the impacts of factors such as pelleting of feeds or use of binders to reduce bioavailability of alkaloids require study. Accordingly, unknowns greatly outnumber the knowns for cereal ergot and further study to help better define allowable limits for livestock would be welcome.
- dc.identifier.citation
- Coufal-Majewski, S., Stanford, K., McAllister, T., Blakley, B., McKinnon, J., Chaves, A. V., & Wang, Y. (2016). Impacts of cereal ergot in food animal production. Frontiers in Veterinary Science, 3. https://doi.org/10.3389/fvets.2016.00015
- dc.identifier.doi
- https://doi.org/10.3389/fvets.2016.00015
- dc.identifier.issn
- 2297-1769
- dc.identifier.uri
- https://open-science.canada.ca/handle/123456789/4047
- dc.language.iso
- en
- dc.publisher - en
- Frontiers Media S.A.
- dc.publisher - fr
- Frontiers Media S.A.
- dc.rights - en
- Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
- dc.rights - fr
- Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
- dc.rights.uri - en
- https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
- dc.rights.uri - fr
- https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.fr
- dc.subject - en
- Agriculture
- Livestock
- Animal nutrition
- Animal health
- dc.subject - fr
- Agriculture
- Bétail
- Alimentation animale
- Santé animale
- dc.subject.en - en
- Agriculture
- Livestock
- Animal nutrition
- Animal health
- dc.subject.fr - fr
- Agriculture
- Bétail
- Alimentation animale
- Santé animale
- dc.title - en
- Impacts of cereal ergot in food animal production
- dc.type - en
- Article
- dc.type - fr
- Article
- local.article.journaltitle - en
- Frontiers in Veterinary Science
- local.article.journalvolume
- 3
- local.peerreview - en
- Yes
- local.peerreview - fr
- Oui
- local.requestdoi - en
- No
- local.requestdoi - fr
- No
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