CONCLUSIONS
The present data do not support the concept
that basic meat quality characteristics
can be manipulated by changing only
the source of energy or the starch degradability.
Steaks from animals fed a fibrous
diet ad libitum were evaluated as good as
steaks from starchy diets in terms of tenderness
and juiciness. The steaks from the
fibre fed group were ranked slightly but
significantly lower compared to the starch
fed groups but only for flavour. The fibrous
diet resulted in an equivalent proportion of
PUFA and CLA in the intramuscular fat,
whereas the proportion of linolenic acid
was at least three times higher. These results
indicate that the diet may impact on
the fatty acid pattern of the muscle or kidney
fat. It may be concluded that feeding
low priced fibrous diets such as grass silage
plus sugar beet pulp ad libitum had no adverse
effects on meat quality and eating attributes.
In addition, the high fibre diet improved
the fatty acid profile of muscle and
adipose tissue by increasing CLA in the
kidney fat, C18:3 fatty acid and PUFA contents
compared to starch rich diets based on
maize silage.