article · Animals
Tannins are plant compounds that can function as both antinutritional factors and bioactive components in livestock diets. This meta-analysis synthesized data from ninety-seven published studies to evaluate how dietary tannins affect small ruminants, including their growth, nutrient intake, digestibility, carcass traits, and meat quality. The findings show that tannin supplementation increases dry matter, crude protein, and nitrogen intake, while decreasing overall nutrient digestibility. It also alters nitrogen excretion by raising faecal nitrogen while lowering urinary nitrogen, ammonia nitrogen, and blood urea nitrogen. In terms of meat quality, tannins reduce cold carcass weight, subcutaneous fat thickness, and drip loss. Crucially, they enrich the meat with beneficial polyunsaturated fatty acids, including omega-three and omega-six profiles, without altering overall animal productivity or antioxidative status.
Understanding the dietary effects of tannins allows livestock producers to optimize feed formulations. Tannins can alter nitrogen excretion pathways, which may help lower urinary nitrogen losses linked to environmental concerns. Simultaneously, they enhance the nutritional quality of meat by enriching it with healthier polyunsaturated fatty acids, offering potential benefits for consumers seeking healthier red meat options.
This meta-analysis provides aggregated evidence for animal feed manufacturers and livestock producers considering tannins as a functional feed additive. The work is at an applied research stage based on secondary trial data. Practical commercialisation would require feed formulators to balance the trade-offs between improved meat fatty acid profiles and the documented reductions in nutrient digestibility and cold carcass weight.
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Tannins are secondary metabolites naturally present in various plants as a defense mechanism. In animal nutrition, they play a dual role, acting as both antinutritional factors and bioactive agents, with potential benefits in nutrient metabolism and product quality. This meta-analysis aimed to evaluate the effects of dietary tannin on nutrient intake and digestibility, blood serum metabolite levels, growth performance, carcass characteristics, and meat quality in small ruminants. Ninety-seven studies were included in this meta-analysis. The effects of tannins were analyzed using a random-effects model to determine the weighted mean difference between treatments with tannins and the control (without tannins). Publication bias and heterogeneity between studies were explored, and meta-regression and subgroup analyses were performed. The results indicated that tannin significantly increased the intake of dry matter, crude protein, nitrogen (N), fecal N, and meat fatty acids (FA), such as C18:2 ω6, C18:3 ω3, C20:4 ω6, C20:5 ω3, total ω3 and ω6 FA, and total polyunsaturated FA (PUFA). However, NH3-N, urinary N, blood urea nitrogen, cold carcass weight, subcutaneous fat thickness, drip loss, and nutrient digestibility decreased. In conclusion, tannin in small ruminants did not affect animal productivity and antioxidative status, but mainly modified nitrogen metabolism and improved the fatty acid profile of meat.
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DOI: 10.3390/ani15040596
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