Abstract
As one of the dominant waterfowl species of wetland areas in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, since 2003, artificial rearing of bar-headed geese (Anser indicus) has increased in several provinces of China for the purpose of conservation and economic development. In this study, we systematically characterized the microbial community diversity, compositions and predicted functions of semi-artificially reared bar-headed geese by sampling five different gut locations (the oropharynxs, crops, gizzards, ceca, and cloacae) along the gastrointestinal tracts of three individuals. Alpha diversity analyses showed that the gizzards had the richest species diversity and that the ceca had the least. Beta diversity analyses showed that the cecal samples formed their own cluster, while samples from the oropharynxs, crops, gizzards, and cloacae overlapped with each other. At the phylum level, Firmicutes, Proteobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Actinobacteria, and Fusobacteria constituted the top five dominant phyla among all five gastrointestinal sections. At the genus level, a total of 10 genera with proportions above 2.5% were found to be significantly different among the gastrointestinal sections. Furthermore, 53 genera were detected in all gastrointestinal sections of bar-headed geese. PICRUSt data also predicted a group of microbial functions overrepresented in the different segments of the gastrointestinal tracts. Understanding the microbiota along the bar-headed geese gastrointestinal tracts is essential for future microbiological study of this bird and may contribute to the development of geese husbandry.
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Acknowledgments
We thank the Fei Yan specialized breeding and rearing farming cooperative for permission to undertake this study on their property. The authors would like to express their sincere thanks to the editor in chief, editor, and anonymous reviewers for their valuable suggestions in revising the manuscript.
Funding
The study was supported by the Natural Science Foundation of Qinghai Province of China (Grant No. 2018-ZJ-932Q), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 31460569 and 31960277), the Project of Qinghai Science & Technology Department (Grant No. 2016-ZJ-Y01), the Open Project of State Key Laboratory of Plateau Ecology and Agriculture, Qinghai University (Grant No. 2017-ZZ-21) and the project of Tao He Yuan National Wetland Park in Qinghai Province (Grant No. 2018-THY-01). Dr. Wen Wang was supported by “1000 Talent” programs of Qinghai Province.
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Wen Wang conceived and designed the study. Zhuoma Lancuo and Shuoying Wang collected the samples. Fang Wang, Aizhen Wang and Kirill Sharshov performed the data analysis. Wen Wang wrote the first draft. Kirill Sharshov and Alexey Druzyaka discussed and revised the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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All experiments involving animals were reviewed and approved by the Ethical Committee of Qinghai University and conformed to the guidelines for the care and use of experimental animals established by the Ministry of Science and Technology of the People’s Republic of China (Publication no. 2006-398).
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Wang, W., Wang, F., Wang, A. et al. Characterization of the microbiome along the gastrointestinal tracts of semi-artificially reared bar-headed geese (Anser indicus). Folia Microbiol 65, 533–543 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12223-019-00758-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12223-019-00758-4