The Mycotoxin Threat Is Growing. How to Build Resilience from the Inside Out

Mycotoxins have always been a fact of life in animal feed. What's changed is the scale of the challenge they pose. Producers, nutritionists, and ingredient formulators are seeing more mycotoxins, more often, in more places, and the reason isn't a mystery. It's climate change.

“Climate change is really driving the mycotoxin challenge,” says David Shortall, Acadian's Global Market Development Manager. “The crops we grow today are more impacted by abiotic stress and extreme weather throughout the growing season. They're increasingly being affected by higher levels of drought, higher levels of humidity, more wet weather conditions, and that's increasing the frequency and volume of the mycotoxin threat.”

The mechanics are direct: higher temperatures drive higher levels of aflatoxins, and higher rainfall increases DON (deoxynivalenol) in grains. Increasingly, both are happening in the same growing regions in the same season.

“In a lot of cases, the areas where we grow grain crops all experience higher temperatures, drought stress, and extreme rainfall, sometimes in the same growing season,” Shortall explains. “That means you have the multiple threat from mycotoxins, which affects the grains in different ways and also have different fungal infections.”

It's also a geography problem, not just an intensity problem. “You're actually seeing more mycotoxins migrate North, where more northern countries didn't have the same effect from mycotoxins in the past,” Shortall says. For an industry that already runs on thin margins, the resulting risks are concrete: reduced feed intake and growth performance, lower milk and meat production, suppressed immune function, reproductive challenges over time, and contamination risk that can carry through to meat, milk, and eggs.

Acadian’s Tasco solution is based on Ascophyllum nodosum seaweed, a sustainable regenerative resource that grows naturally in the North Atlantic. Due to this harsh environment, it has over time developed unique bioactive compounds. “The combination of these bioactive compounds has a prebiotic effect that supports gut health, modulates the immune system, and helps mitigate the impacts of stress in production animals..”

Acadian has documented how each compound functions through metabolic analysis:

• Fucoidans (FCPs): Prebiotic and anti-inflammatory, promoting a healthy microbiome and enhancing mucosal morphology for better nutrient uptake
• Phlorotannins: A class of polyphenolics unique to brown seaweed, acting as antimicrobial and antioxidant agents
• Alginate: A dietary fiber that improves gut morphology, directly increasing surface area for nutrient absorption
• Fucoxanthin: A pigment that reduces free radicals
• Iodine, minerals, and vitamins: Supporting thyroid function, metabolic rate, and the animal's own antioxidant response

It's the combination that matters, not any single compound. “It's not just about one single component, or targeting disease or a stress-causing issue such as mycotoxins,” Shortall says. “It's the whole package in terms of improving overall animal health through its prebiotic effects and improved gut health, which is then making the animal more resilient.”

On validation, Shortall points to real-world use by major players in the category: Acadian is working with several global leaders in the mycotoxin management market, and Acadian’s approach has long been proven as a key solution in the formulation of mycotoxin management programs. Shortall is clear that it isn't a single-ingredient fix: “It's a mix of bioactive compounds, minerals and trace elements that combine to bring real benefits in terms of building biological resilience and reducing the impact or threat from mycotoxins.”

That track record sits on top of Acadian's broader foundation: 45 years of marine bioscience research into Ascophyllum nodosum seaweed and its applications across animal, plant, and human wellness.

Regulatory scrutiny around feed ingredients is tightening, and consumers are asking harder questions about what goes into animal production. Both trends point in the same direction: toward natural, sustainable ingredients that build resilience rather than mask a problem.

“When we look at the animal feed industry today, they are looking towards more natural, sustainable feed ingredients that can help reduce the risk of mycotoxins but also having animals that have a more robust immune system, better gut health, to be able to deal with these environmental threats like mycotoxins,” Shortall says. “This is where our product fits very strongly. It builds that biological resilience within the animal.”

The formulators and nutritionists best positioned to mitigate the impact of mycotoxins aren't the ones searching for a way to eliminate them from the feed supply. They're the ones building resilience into the animal itself.

With Tasco, Acadian offers a proven, easy-to-integrate way to do exactly that — backed by 45 years of science and three decades of real-world use.