Effect of Silage Diet (Sweet Sorghum vs. Whole-Crop Corn) and Breed on Growth Performance, Carcass Traits, and Meat Quality of Lambs
Pu Wu,
Xiaoyue Fu,
Hucheng Wang,
Mingjie Hou,
Zhanhuan Shang
Affiliations
Pu Wu
State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro-Ecosystems, Engineering Research Center of Grassland Industry, Ministry of Education, College of Pastoral Agriculture Science and Technology, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730020, China
Xiaoyue Fu
State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro-Ecosystems, Engineering Research Center of Grassland Industry, Ministry of Education, College of Pastoral Agriculture Science and Technology, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730020, China
Hucheng Wang
State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro-Ecosystems, Engineering Research Center of Grassland Industry, Ministry of Education, College of Pastoral Agriculture Science and Technology, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730020, China
Mingjie Hou
State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro-Ecosystems, Engineering Research Center of Grassland Industry, Ministry of Education, College of Pastoral Agriculture Science and Technology, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730020, China
Zhanhuan Shang
State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro-Ecosystems, College of Life Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China
Diet and breed directly affect ruminant carcass traits and meat quality. Therefore, this research aimed to evaluate the effect of silage diet and breed on growth performance, carcass traits, and meat quality of lambs. A total of 28, 3–4 months old female lambs consisting of 14 Dorper lambs (DP) and 14 Thin-tailed Han lambs (TH) were allocated in a 2 × 2 factorial design and offered two experimental diets (sweet sorghum silage: SS; whole-crop corn silage: WS) for 90 days. Lambs fed the WS diet had a higher growth performance (p p p p p > 0.05). The meat of the DP lambs showed lower values of initial pH, shear force, lightness (L*), redness (a*), and saturated fatty acid (SFA) content (p < 0.05). The lamb breed influenced fewer variables of growth performance and carcass characteristics compared to the diet. The lambs fed the SS diet had higher nutritional quality meat than lambs fed the WS diet.
