THE SHORT-TERM EFFECT OF LOW CONCENTRATIONS OF DIETARY ANATOXIN AND T-2 TOXIN ON MALLARD DUCKLINGS

Two 9-day trials to study effects of dietary mycotoxins were conducted using 6-week-old mallards. Each trial involved three groups of six du cks each, three males and three females per group. One group was fed n o mycotoxin (control), one was fed anatoxin, and the third was fed T-2 toxin. Dietary anatoxin was 12 ppb in trial 1 and 33 ppb in trial 2; dietary T-2 toxin was 2 ppm in both trials. There were no gross or mic roscopic lesions in controls or in ducks fed anatoxin, nor did these g roups differ significantly in final body weight or in weights of splee n or bursa of Fabricius. Ducks exposed to T-2 toxin had erosions and/ or ulcerations in the oral cavity and esophagus; further, these ducks exhibited a decrease in weights of body, thymus, spleen, and bursa of Fabricius. The only microscopic change seen in lymphoid organs of duck s exposed to T-2 toxin was a moderate decrease of thymic cortical lymp hocytes.