The poultry industry continues to emphasize the importance of clean drinking water systems for their birds. While there are products available which do an excellent job of eliminating biofilms and completely cleaning water systems of potentially harmful bacteria, not all products are easy to handle nor are they readily available to all poultry growers. In addition, as the use of water acidifiers becomes more popular, the incidence of fungal blooms in water systems has also increased. Most fungi need pH values of 2-6 to survive. When acidifiers are used without a good sanitizer present, then a clear, thick fungal slime can potentially occur, which, once established, can be very difficult to remove. Fungal slimes can also occur after the use of water soluble antibiotics. Antibiotics can impair the growth of bacteria, leaving the system vulnerable to fungal blooms particularly if the grower does not have a good daily water sanitation program.
Criteria for Water Line Cleaners
1. Approved by the Environmental Protection Agency as safe to use in drinking water systems,
2. Safe to use and handle,
3. Not corrosive or damaging to the equipment,
4. Effective in removing slime or biofilm from pipes and drinkers,
5. Affordable and available
Because of these and other concerns, the need to identify a variety of good line cleaning products remains important to the industry. Therefore, it is the mission of our lab (Center of Excellence for Poultry Science) to continue to evaluate new products utilizing a test method which simulates the slimy conditions that can occur in poultry house water lines.
In this test, five water sanitizers were evaluated for their effectiveness in killing total aerobic (oxygen or air loving) bacteria and molds. The products were:
1. AquaVite – acidified copper based water treatment,
2. PronTech™ – ammonia based cleaner,
3. Proxy-Clean® – 50% stabilized hydrogen peroxide,
4. Oxine® – stabilized chlorine dioxide
5. Sterilex® – buffered alkaline product
Methods
Each product was added to 3 replicate beakers of 50 ml of water containing algae. Water containing algae was used to create a heavy microbial challenge for the cleaners. Three untreated 50 ml aliquots served as the control and received no treatment. Prior to addition of the product to the water, an initial aerobic bacteria and mold count were determined for each 50 ml aliquot. Each treatment was tested at the concentrations listed in Table 1.
The aliquots were held uncovered at room temperature and retested at 4 and 24 hours post treatment application.
Results were analyzed using the GLM procedure of SAS. Prior to analysis, the microbial data was converted to log10 to normalize the data set. Significantly different means were separated using the least square means repeated t-test.
Results
The initial aerobic plate counts (APC) did significantly differ among the treatments, but all were 5 logs or higher which translates to over 100,000 colony forming units of aerobic bacteria per ml. At 4 hours APC from control water remained unchanged and high as did the two AquaVite treatments. The 0.78 percent Proxy-Clean® APC also remained high, but were about a log lower than control counts. APC from Proxy-Clean® 3 percent, PronTech™ 0.5%, PronTech™ pH 3.0 1 percent and Sterilex® 1.25 percent were about two logs lower than control. The Sterilex® 2.5 percent and the Oxine® treatments reduced APC at 4 hours by 5 and 6 logs respectively. At 24 hours APC was reduced to undetectable levels by the Proxy-PronTech™, Clean® 3.0 percent, Oxine® and Sterilex® treatments. Aerobicbacteria were detected in all other treatments. The initial mold levels for each treatment ranged from 1.7 to 3 logs. All treatments except AquaVite completely eliminated of mold from the test waters. In conclusion, several products were evaluated for their ability to kill aerobic bacteria and molds in the presence of a heavy organic load. Several of the test products significantly reduced the microbial load in the water, while others tested were not as effective.
Jennifer Hughes, Amanda Hancock, Brookee Dean and Susan Watkins are with the Center of Excellence for Poultry Science, University of Arkansas.
