Description:
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title>
<jats:p>This study was conducted to identify connections between drinking water quality and the oral, nasal, vaginal, and rectal microbiota of sows at two locations (n = 40, 20/location): North Carolina State Swine Education Unit (SEU) and Tidewater Research Facility (TW). Water samples were taken from each location and analyzed for potable water parameters. DNA from the sow and replicate water samples were extracted via column chromatography, were sent to the University of Arkansas for 16S rRNA sequencing (Illumina MiSeq platform), and microbiota data were filtered and aligned using the QIIME2 2020.2 pipeline. Data were considered significant at P ≤ 0.05 for main effects and Q ≤ 0.05 for pairwise differences. Microbial alpha diversity for TW was significantly greater than SEU for oral samples and rectal samples (Shannon, Pielou’s evenness, richness indices). Alpha diversity for TW was significantly greater than SEU for vaginal samples (Shannon, richness, Faith’s PD indices). There were no significant differences in alpha diversity indices between TW and SEU water. There were significant differences between locations for all beta diversity metrics (PERMANOVA P &lt; 0.05, Q &lt; 0.05), possibly due to dispersion within treatments (PERMDISP P &lt; 0.05, Q &lt; 0.05). TW water had greater proportional compositional differences (ANCOM) at class level than SEU water for Campylobacteria (median: 1941 vs. 244) and Anaerolineae (median: 343 vs. 152), and TW water had lower Micrarchaeia abundance than SEU water (median: 57 and 677, respectively). TW water samples had greater Na (133.9 ppm), Cl (112.6 ppm), and hardness (188.4 ppm CaCO3) compared to SEU water samples (Na: 7.0 ppm, Cl: 5.3 ppm, hardness: 46.9 ppm CaCO3; P &lt; 0.001). These water parameters did not exceed quality standards. Oral, nasal, rectal and vaginal microbiomes were distinctly different in sows from different locations. Therefore, drinking water and location may influence the sow microbiome.</jats:p>