Animal water amendments for lowering ammonia concentrations in animal excrement

Abstract

Improved animal feeds and / or waters are provided, which include amendments comprising one or more copolymer salts serving to reduce volatilized ammonia derived from the excrement of animals. The copolymers are preferably water soluble and have substantially equimolar amounts of maleic and itaconic moieties.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS[0001]This application is a continuation of application Ser. No. 14 / 049,887 filed Oct. 9, 2013, which is a continuation-in-part of application Ser. No. 13 / 791,263 filed Mar. 8, 2013, which claims the benefit of Provisional Application Ser. No. 61 / 713,757 filed Oct. 15, 2012, and each of the foregoing applications is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0002]1. Field of the Invention[0003]The present invention is broadly concerned with animal feed and / or water amendments, and corresponding methods, which are designed to reduce the amount of gaseous ammonia resulting from the decomposition of animal excrement (i.e., manure and urine). More particularly, the invention is concerned with such amendments comprising copolymer salts, e.g., maleic-itaconic copolymer salts, which can be added to animal feed and / or water. A variety of livestock animals may be treated using the invention, including poultry and mammal...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0012]It has now been discovered that highly useful animal feed and / or water amendments can be provided which serve to significantly reduce gaseous ammonia concentrations in animal containment facilities. In particular, it has been found that amendments including salts (both complete and partial) of certain polyanionic copolymers can be added to animal feed and / or water to good effect. For example, conventional poultry feeds comprising feed ingredients including quantities of corn and soybean meal can be improved using the amendments of the invention. In like manner, poultry water may be supplemented with the amendments. In either instance, the amount of amendment used should be sufficient to reduce volatilized ammonia derived from the feces of poultry, as compared with poultry receiving the same feed and / or water, but without the amendments. Similarly, mammalian animal feeds and waters can be improved by the addition of the copolymers of the invention, again in amounts sufficient to reduce volatilized ammonia derived from mammalian excrement, as compared with animals receiving the same feed and / or water, but without the amendments.

Problems solved by technology

Ammonia is a common by-product of animal waste due to the often inefficient conversion of feed nitrogen into animal protein.

In like manner, ruminants such as cattle are often fed non-protein nitrogen (NPN) as a part of their normal diets, and this can also exacerbate the problem of excess ammonia in cattle excrement.

Elevated levels of ammonia can have a negative impact on animal health and production, resulting in increased susceptibility to bacterial respiratory infection, decreased weight gains, and feed conversions.

However, these efforts, while marginally reducing gaseous ammonia, have not fully answered the need to significantly ameliorate the ammonia problem.

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