Eighteen ½ Ile de France ½ Polwarth sheep (6 no castrated lambs, 6 discarded ewes and 6 discarded wethers) were used to evaluate qualitative traits of meat from different categories of sheep for muscle cuts (shoulder, loin and leg). The animals were raised in grazing system with tifton-85 pastures and supplemented with concentrate. Lambs were slaughtered at 32 kg body weight, close to 5 months of age. Ewes and wethers were slaughtered with 55 kg and 60 months of age. […]

The objective of this study was to evaluate the correlations between rainfall data and goat productive traits in Alpine X Gurgueia breeds goats, raised in a intensive regime in the Ocidental Cariri, a semi-arid microclime of Paraíba State, Brazil. Birth weight, milk production and mortality of kids to 90 days of age and rainfall data from the Carnauba Farm were used. The rainfall data were transformed in Logx. The birth weight, milk production and mortality correlated reasonably correlated with the […]

The objective of this experiment was to evaluate the yield and quality of the carcass and meat cuts from kids of both sexes, slaughtered at three different ages, aiming to use animals from dairy herds. Forty-one kids were used, from three breed groups: Alpine, ½ Boer ½ Alpine (½ BA) and ¾ Boer ¼ Alpine (¾ BA), which were slaughtered at 60, 90 or 120 days of slaughter age. The animals were raised in a feedlot system. The following carcass […]

The objective of this study was to evaluate the correlations between the measurements obtained by ultrasound and from the carcass and follow the development of the ribeye and fat thickness in buffaloes at different feedlot stages. Twenty castrated, hornless Murrah buffaloes were used. The buffaloes were separated into four groups that were slaughtered at 75, 100, 125, 150 days of feedlot. The measurements taken by ultrasound when the buffaloes reached the slaughter point and from the carcass after the slaughter […]

The objective of this experiment was to identify the effect of row spacing (0.90 m and 1.30 m) and harvesting ages on the chemical composition and characteristics of sugarcane silage and productivity of the RB72-454 variety sugarcane. The experiment was carried out from November 2004 to January 2006. Treatments consisted of a combination of 0.90 m and 1.30 m row spacing and harvesting ages were 240 days (plant-cane), 180 days (regrowth) and 420 days (plant-cane). A randomized block experimental design […]

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of vitamin A feed supplementation on the following boar semen characteristics: volume, motility, vigor, seminal pH, spermatic concentration, total number of spermatozoa, percentage of living sperm cells and morphologic abnormalities. The experiment was carried out with 10 hybrid boars (328.5 ± 2.12 days of age and 191.0 ± 12.0 kg live weight). The boars were separated into two treatments and fed with two vitamin A levels: control, 10.000 UI/kg feed […]

The performance was evaluated of beef crossbred Holstein-Zebu steers, supplemented with different protein sources on pasture of Brachiaria brizantha, cv. Marandu, during the wet season. The area was divided into paddocks of 1.5 ha, with an availability of dry matter and potentially digestible dry matter of 7.46 and 4.50 t/ha, respectively. Twenty-five animals with 229 kg initial weight and 12 months of age were distributed in a complete randomized design, with five treatments and five replications. The following treatments were […]

The objective of this study was to evaluate the nutritive value of two pasture-based systems (PS), with elephant grass (EG) + ryegrass (RG) + white clover (WC) + spontaneous growing species (SGS), for PS1; and EG + RG + forage peanut (FP) + SGS, for PS2. Four paddocks, each one with 0.25 ha, were used in the assessment. A complete randomized block design was used with two replications (paddocks). The EG was established in rows with 4 m spacing. Pastures […]

The experiment was carried out to evaluate the development of beef heifers from 15 to 28 months of age, maintained on natural pasture under different herbage allowance (HA) managements. The treatments were fixed HA of 4, 8, 12 and 16% of the body weight (BW) over the year, and variable HA of 8-12%; 12-8%; and 16-12%, where the first value corresponded to the HA used in the spring and the second one to that used in the remainder of the […]

The objective of the experiment was to evaluate discarded ewes slaughtered at different physiological stages and terminated in feedlot for yields of carcass and cuts and the percentage of each non carcass component. Twenty-one Santa Inês ewes were used, with average age of six years old, distributed into the following treatments: EL = ewes that had remained in lactation for 60 days with their respective lambs until slaughtering; EWL = ewes that remained in lactation for 60 days with their […]