Effects of Age and Rice Straw Inclusion Levels in the Diet of Yiling Cull Cows on Growth Performance, Meat Quality, and Antioxidant Status of Tissues

Effects of Age and Rice Straw Inclusion Levels in the Diet of Yiling Cull Cows on Growth Performance, Meat Quality, and Antioxidant Status of Tissues

The objectives of this study were to investigate the effects of age and dietary straw levels on growth performance, carcass and meat traits, as well as tissue antioxidant status of Yiling cull cows. Twenty-four Yiling cull cows were arranged in a 2 × 2 factorial design: two age classes consisting of...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Animals (Basel) Vol. 11; no. 6; p. 1732
Main Authors: Qiu, Xinjun, Qin, Xiaoli, Chen, Liming, Qiu, Qinghua, Wang, Haibo, Aziz ur Rahmanand, Muhammad, Cao, Binghai, Su, Huawei
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: Basel MDPI AG 10-06-2021
MDPI
Subjects:
Age
Age factors
Aging
Analytical chemistry
Animals
antioxidant status
Antioxidants
Beef
Beef cattle
Body weight
Carcasses
Catalase
Cattle
Connective tissue
Cooking
Diet
Digestibility
Dry matter
Factorial design
Fatty acids
Meat
Meat quality
Methods
Muscles
Quality management
Rice
Rice straw
Straw
straw levels
Superoxide dismutase
Tissues
Yiling cull cows
China
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Summary:The objectives of this study were to investigate the effects of age and dietary straw levels on growth performance, carcass and meat traits, as well as tissue antioxidant status of Yiling cull cows. Twenty-four Yiling cull cows were arranged in a 2 × 2 factorial design: two age classes consisting of younger cull cows (YCC; appearing with three or four pairs of permanent teeth) and older cull cows (OCC; worn out teeth); two dietary treatments consisting of lower and higher rice straw levels (LRS and HRS; providing 0.7 kg/d and 1.2 kg/d rice straw per head based on air-dry basis, respectively). Cows were fed twice a day. Straw was offered at half of the predetermined weight each meal; concentrate was separately supplied ad libitum. After 300 d of feeding, final body weight (BW), total BW gain, average daily gain and gain:feed intake were higher (p < 0.01) in the YCC group than in the OCC group. Total dry matter intake was higher (p = 0.03) in the HRS group than in the LRS group, but neutral detergent fiber apparent digestibility was negatively affected (p = 0.01) by increased straw levels. Decreased C15:0, C17:0, C20:5n3c, and saturated fatty acids (SFAs) proportion as well as increased C18:1n9c and monounsaturated fatty acids (MUFAs) proportion in meat from YCC with HRS diet were observed as compared to that in meat from YCC with LRS diet (p < 0.05). Meat from HRS group had higher (p = 0.04) C18:3n3c proportion than meat from LRS group. No significant differences (p > 0.05) were found for meat quality attributes except for cooking loss, which was higher (p = 0.02) in the HRS group than in the LRS group. Both YCC group and HRS group had higher (p < 0.05) cold carcass weight compared to OCC group and LRS group. Moreover, catalase activity of liver tissue was higher (p = 0.045) in YCC than in OCC, while superoxide dismutase activity of muscle tissue was higher (p = 0.01) in LRS than in HRS. Based on results, we concluded that younger age and feeding high-level straw can improve the finishing performance of Yiling cull cows.
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ISSN:2076-2615
2076-2615
DOI:10.3390/ani11061732