VSL#3DS

Probiotics are designed to work in the large intestine which we dont have. Careful because they can increase chances of SIBO.

There are plenty of bacterial probiotics, but they generally are much lower doses (# of viable bacteria) than the usual VSL #3 or Visbiome doses. Some of the research that studied VSL #3 originally suggested that high doses are valuable. The particular collection of bacterial strains varies among brands, but may not be the most critical thing. Some people recommend Align. I’m not aware of any evidence that probiotics increase the risk of SIBO.

I have heard that it's more important to vary your probiotics, and that having too much of one can cause imbalance in the intestinal flora.  I used to take VSL#3/visbiome all the time, but now I alternate it with a variety of probiotic supplements and other probiotic-rich food like yogurt, sauerkraut, preserved lemons, etc.,  It works better for me and it's cheaper.  I still take the visbiome/VSL#3 here and there, for example, if I feel inflammation coming on I might take a couple of the capsules a few times in a row.  I really like Jarrow's shelf-stable probiotics, too.  Since I moved away from the 1 probiotic approach, my guts have been happier in general.

I'm a yogurt fan. Stonyfield organic probiotic has 6 active cultures. Brown Cow has 5. Many of them are the same strains in the supplements. I eat about a cup of yogurt a day and really notice the difference when I don't have it in my diet.

I eat a large tomato and cucumber salad every morning with fresh and pickled cucumbers. I add the pickle juice that comes in the jar in the salad as dressing, it is filled with probiotic bacteria.

I buy pickles without preservatives, they are hard to find in the store! You will need to read a lot of jars before you can find one. There is one German brand that makes shelf stable pickles that I know "Hengstenberg", but most pickles without preservatives are found in the refrigerators in the store.

There are really two different things being talked about here. Basic, reasonably priced probiotics, both natural (in food) and in capsule form, are very likely good to some degree for the balance of bacteria in the colon. J-pouchers don't have colons, of course, so it's more of a leap to suppose that they are useful for us, but they might be.

Quite separately, very high doses of probiotic bacteria, originally under the name VSL #3, have been shown in J-pouchers to decrease the frequency of pouchitis. Two products, VSL #3 and Visbiome, are similar to what was studied for this purpose. This function can't really be replaced by some yogurt, sauerkraut, or pickles, because the doses are vastly different. By all means enjoy these foods, and whatever benefit you may experience, but it's best not to confuse it with the 3.6 trillion bacteria in a max daily dose of VSL.

Along the same lines, is there any value in pre-biotics taken with a probiotic?

I think so!  For me, organic psyllium husk powder (I always say "organic" because the non-organic is markedly different and doesn't work as well for me) works to slow down my guts, which allows for more establishment of good flora by the use of probiotic foods & supplements.

Here's an analogy:  In my neighborhood I used to know my neighbors, and now with the horrible economy in Austin, TX, it's impossible for normal people to afford to live in my hood (or any place within a hundred miles).  All that move here are transient rich people who live in the crappy, recently built mansions that replaced the beautiful 1940's-1950's homes and obviously, make the neighborhood hideous wherever they appear.  The brief stays of the crappy mansion inhabitants (along with their inability to leave their houses except to go to their cars) make it difficult to establish community.  They are not good prebiotics, and do not establish healthy flora.  So the neighborhood (gut) is becoming ill with mansions (sores, inflammation) and the transient (fast-moving) population (food) make it difficult to establish culture and connectedness (probiotics) which make a healthy community (good intestinal flora).