Performance and carcass evaluation of balami rams finished on diets with varying energy level

Abstract

Fattening of farm animals is a way of increasing the rate of meat deposit after maturity. Its effectiveness depends on genetic status of the animal and the diet fed to the animal. In this study, performance and carcass evaluation of balami rams finished on diets with varying energy levels were carried. Forty-eight rams of Balami breed, weighing 20.75±1.50- 22.50±1.91kg were randomly alloted to four dietary energy levels (EL): 2.20Mcal/kg (EL_I),  2.40 Mcal/kg ((EL_II), 2.60 Mcal/kg ((EL_III) and 2.80 Mcal/kg ((EL_IV) for 90 days. The feed intake and daily weight gain of the animals in each treatment were determined and the average recorded. Three Balami rams were randomly selected from each treatment and sacrificed to determine the dressing percentage (DP), carcass weight (CW), fat deposit (FD) and meat yield (MY). Data were analysed using descriptive statistics and ANOVA at á . The 0.05 FBW (kg) of Balami rams in group EL_I, EL_II, EL_III and EL_IV were 41.88.6±1.97, 42.12±1.84, 46.13±1.65 and 52.24±2.50 while the FCR of animals on treatments EL_I(5.3±0.28) and EL_II (5.2±0.26) were higher than EL_III (4.7±0.82) and EL_IV  (4.0±0.65). The DP (%) were 54.9, 54.9, 55.8 and 56.1, the FD (%) were 9.00,9.59,8.92 and 11.46 and the MY (%) were 75.2, 74.7, 75.5 and 72.0 for rams on EL_I, EL_II, EL_III and EL_IV. The results indicate that, increasing  levels of energy improved growth performance and carcass quality of Balami rams.
Therefore, higher level of dietary energy (2.80 Mcal/kgDM and 14% CP) could be suggested for optimizing growth performance and meat quality of Balami ram under fattening condition.

Keywords: Balami, dietary energy, fattening, meat quality, dressing percentage, keeping quality