ABSTRACT
Carcass yield of fat-tailed Karadi lambs was investigated. A total of 32 The Karadi lambs screened from various commercial sheep flocks from four different geographic zones (Sharazoor, Halabja, Sharbazher, and Penjween) in Sulaimani governorate, Kurdistan, Iraq. Eight lambs from each of the 4 ecological zones were randomly assigned to 2 feeding treatments (concentrate diet vs. whole barley grain) at a level of 2% of their body weights with 4-6 hours a day stubble grazing. Results revealed that overall means weights recorded at slaughter (38.263 ±1.4 kg), hot carcass (17.199 ±0.8 kg), dressing percentage (44.901 ±1.1%), neck (0.436 ±0.02 kg), shoulder (1.633 ±0.1 kg), loin (0.529 ±0.03 kg), rack (0.782 ±0.1 kg), breast (0.577 ±0.03 kg), fore shank (0.448 ±0.03 kg) and flank (0.276 ±0.02 kg). Overall means of fat thickness, rib eye area and kidney and pelvic fat were 1.790 ±0.3 mm, 13.967 ±0.6 cm2. Types of feed (barley or concentrate) had no statistical effects on carcass characteristics. Lambs fed barley recorded marginally higher weight at slaughtering, neck, head, feet, leg, shoulder, breast and fore shank as well as rib eye area. On the other hand, lambs fed concentrate had unmarked higher weights of hot carcass, heart, liver, kidney, tests, kidney and pelvic fat, tail, loin, rack and flank as well as higher dressing percentage and fat thickness. Geographic location affected weight at slaughter and some other carcass traits. It was concluded that there was a high genetic variation in carcass traits of lambs from different geographic location in Sulaimani province.
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