EFFECT OF TWO DIFFERENT REARING SYSTEMS ON TEXTURAL TRAITS, COLOR PARAMETERS AND OXIDATIVE STATUS OF MEAT FROM BÍSARO PIG

<p>INTRODUCTION: The effect of the rearing system on pig meat quality is still under study and differing evidences are found in the literature on this subject. Lebret (2008), discussed the influence of rearing system on meat quality referring the controversial data, and reported higher daily gain with outdoor rearing, whereas some significant differences in meat drip loss and pH. Moreover little information is available on Bísaro breed and this study was planned, in order to integrate the issue of a high quality product with those related to animal biodiversity and welfare combined with sustainability of livestock production. OBJECTIVES:The present work intended to estimate the impact of growing/finishing Bísaro pigs housed in a hoop barn or in a traditional confinement on some meat quality traits. METHODS<br> • 20 Bísaro pigs equally divided in two groups (five males + five females each: Gr1 – hoop barn (3.0 m2/ pig) with outdoor access (200 m2/pig); and Gr2 - traditional confinement with bedding (1.8 m2/pig).<br> • Both groups were fed with the same diet. During 98 days’ period (growing phase) and until approximately 80 kg live weight (LW), the animals were fed with a concentrate diet. In the finishing phase, consisting of a final 70 days period until slaughter, the animals attained between 110-120 kg LW and were fed with concentrate and cornflour.<br> • Feed intake per group registered daily and growth performances collected every fortnight. The results regarding growth performance from these Bísaro pigs experiment are available on Araújo et al. (2018).</p> <p>• Within 72h postmortem, for all pigs, on the left half of the carcass, two slices of transversal LL taken at last (caudal) rib, approximately 2.5-cm thick, were collected for meat quality traits.<br> • Rearing effects on performance traits assessed by ANOVA, with IBM-SPSS for Wind. (ver 22.0).<br> Model: Yijk=μ+αi+βj+(αβ)ij+εijk; αi, βj: “main effect” of System (Gr1 and Gr2) and Sex (male, female),<br> (αβ)ij: interaction. The differences among system and sex were considered significant at P<0.05.</p> <p>CONCLUSIONS<br> • From this work the rearing system hardly affected technological meat quality traits, with exception of redness.<br> • The redness values are lower in Bísaro pig than Celta (9.64-13.07).<br> • Concerning the oxidative status of LL, TBARS content was very low (0.10-0.11 ppm), compared to other studies (0.16-0.32 ppm ).