Milk Yield, Composition, and Fatty Acid Profile in Dairy Cows Fed a High-concentrate Diet Blended with Oil Mixtures Rich in Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids

Abstract

To evaluate the effects of feeding linseed oil or/and sunflower oil mixed with fish oil on milk yield, milk composition and fatty acid (FA) profiles of dairy cows fed a high-concentrate diet, 24 crossbred primiparous lactating dairy cows in early lactation were assigned to a completely randomized design experiment. All cows were fed a high-concentrate basal diet and 0.38 kg dry matter (DM) molasses per day. Treatments were composed of a basal diet without oil supplement (Control), or diets of (DM basis) 3% linseed and fish oils (1:1, w/w, LSO-FO), or 3% sunflower and fish oils (1:1, w/w, SFO-FO), or 3% mixture (1:1:1, w/w) of linseed, sunflower, and fish oils (MIX-O). The animals fed SFO-FO had a 13.12% decrease in total dry matter intake compared with the control diet (p<0.05). No significant change was detected for milk yield; however, the animals fed the diet supplemented with SFO-FO showed a depressed milk fat yield and concentration by 35.42% and 27.20%, respectively, compared to those fed the control diet (p<0.05). Milk c9, t11-conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) proportion increased by 198.11% in the LSO-FO group relative to the control group (p<0.01). Milk C18:3n-3 (ALA) proportion was enhanced by 227.27% supplementing with LSO-FO relative to the control group (p<0.01). The proportions of milk docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) were significantly increased (p<0.01) in the cows fed LSO-FO (0.38%) and MIX-O (0.23%) compared to the control group (0.01%). Dietary inclusion of LSO-FO mainly increased milk c9, t11-CLA, ALA, DHA, and n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA), whereas feeding MIX-O improved preformed FA and unsaturated fatty acids (UFA). While the lowest n-6/n-3 ratio was found in the LSO-FO, the decreased atherogenecity index (AI) and thrombogenicity index (TI) seemed to be more extent in the MIX-O. Therefore, to maximize milk c9, t11-CLA, ALA, DHA, and n-3 PUFA and to minimize milk n-6/n-3 ratio, AI and TI, an ideal supplement would appear to be either LSO-FO or MIX-O.

Keywords: Dairy Cows; Fish Oil; Linseed Oil; Milk Fatty Acids; Milk Yield; Sunflower Oil.

Figure 1

Average milk fat percentage changes of treatment groups during entire experiment. * p<0.05; ** p<0.01. Diets were statistical significance (p = 0.03), but no significant differences were detected for week and treatment×week interaction (p>0.05).