Carcass Yield and Organ Characteristics of West African Centre Dwarf Rams Fed Ensiled Guinea Grass and Cassava Tops with Different Additives

Authors(2) :-Binuomote R. T., O. J. Babayemi

Twenty five individually housed West African Dwarf (WAD) rams were used to study the effect of ensiled guinea grass and cassava tops mixture with different additives on the performance and carcass characteristics of WAD rams. The guinea grass and cassava tops mixture with different additives were ensiled in ratio 6:3:1 in five treatments designated Treatment 1: 60% Guinea grass +30% cassava tops + 10% cassava chips; Treatment 2: 60% Guinea grass +30% cassava tops + 10% sorghum grain; Treatment 3: 60% Guinea grass +30% cassava tops + 10% millet grain; Treatment 4: 60% Guinea grass +30% cassava tops + 10% sugar and Treatment 5: 60% Guinea grass + 40% cassava tops + 0% additives. The 25 WAD rams were divided into five groups of five animals each. Each group was assigned to the treatments in a completely randomized design (CRD). Each animal in a group represented a replicate. The experiment lasted for 135 days. Data on Weight gain, dressing percentage and carcass quality was collected. Results revealed that the different silages fed to the rams significantly influenced dressing percentage (P<0.05), with values ranging between 50.89% and 53.77 %. Meat cut values showed that leg and shoulder were not significantly different (P<0.05) but the Rack, Neck, Brest and Flank were significantly (P<0.05) affected the legs gave the highest percentage (34.32 – 36.82%). This was followed by shoulder (23.05 – 24.44%), rack (18.58 – 22.54%) and loin (12.00 – 14.85%) in that order. There were no significant differences (P<0.05) among treatment means for all the non-meat parts (head,, feet, full gut) except for the skin. It can be concluded that ram fed treatment 3 performed better in terms of dressing percentage and carcass characteristics.

Authors and Affiliations

Binuomote R. T.
Department of Animal Production and Health, Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, P.M.B. 4000, Ogbomoso, Nigeria
O. J. Babayemi
Department of Animal Science, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria

carcass quality, guinea grass, cassava tops, organ characteristics, WAD rams

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Publication Details

Published in : Volume 3 | Issue 4 | May-June 2017
Date of Publication : 2017-05-30
License:  This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Page(s) : 566-574
Manuscript Number : IJSRST1734199
Publisher : Technoscience Academy

Print ISSN : 2395-6011, Online ISSN : 2395-602X

Cite This Article :

Binuomote R. T., O. J. Babayemi, " Carcass Yield and Organ Characteristics of West African Centre Dwarf Rams Fed Ensiled Guinea Grass and Cassava Tops with Different Additives ", International Journal of Scientific Research in Science and Technology(IJSRST), Print ISSN : 2395-6011, Online ISSN : 2395-602X, Volume 3, Issue 4, pp.566-574, May-June-2017.
Journal URL : https://ijsrst.com/IJSRST1734199
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