ALCOHOL HYDROGENESE ACTIVITY IN THE LIVER OF DAIRY COWS

Abstract

On large farms in our country silage presents an important part in dairy cows ration. During the process of fermentation, different kinds and amounts of alcohol, first of all ethyl alcohol, emerge in silage. Besides this, in rumen of cows fed with easily digested carbohydrates, a small quantity of ethanol can be detected. The aim of this paper was to determine if alcohol added to rumen is resorbed in blood, determine how long it retains in blood and what is ADH activity in liver in the cows that have been receiving alcohol for 21 days. Two experiments were set for this purpose. In the first experiment three cows in the phase of puerperium received 100, 200 or 300 ml/ratio „Energy plus” that contains 30% of ethyl alcohol. The blood was sampled before administration of „Energy plus” (0) and 1, 2, 3 and 4 hours after treatment for determining ethanol concentration. The second experimente included 3 cows in high gravity, 10 days prepartal. They were given „Energy plus” for 21 days (10 days before expected calving and 11 days postpartum). On the eleventh day postpartum the blood and rumen content were sampled for determining ethanol concentration. The rumen content was sampled 1 hour and blood 2 hours after the treatment. Immediately after blood sampling liver biopsy was done for determining ADH activity. The concentration of ethanol in blood was influenced by time of sampling showing the largest differences between the first and second sampling (p=0.01), as well between the first and the third (p=0.03), while between the first and the last two sampling there were no statistically important differences. Also, the correlation coefficient was very high (r=0.92, 0.97 and 0.97) between concentration of alcohol in blood and amount of alcohol that the cows received through ethanol infusion (100, 200, 300 ml). Added amount of alcohol did not significantly change metabolic decomposition of alcohol in liver, since activity of ADH is within the limits of physiological values.