Carcass morphometry of Santa Inês lambs fed cactus pear associated with urea

This study evaluated the effect of replacing soybean meal with increasing levels of urea (0, 8, 16 and 24 g/kg of dry matter) on the carcass morphometric characteristics of finishing Santa Inês sheep fed diets based on cactus pear “Orelha de Elefante Mexicana” (Opuntia Stricta Haw). Forty crossbred Santa Inês lambs with initial weight of 20 ± 1.0 kg were distributed in a completely randomized design with initial body weight as covariate, four treatments and ten replicates. After 60 days of confinement, the animals were slaughtered and the carcasses were kept in a cold room for 24 hours at ± 4ºC. Then, the morphometric measurements were taken: external and internal carcass length (ECL) and (ICL), rump width (RW), rump perimeter (RP), leg length (LL), leg perimeter (LP), chest width (CW) and chest depth (CD). There was no effect (P > 0.05) of the substitution levels on the evaluated variables. The averages observed were: 60.4cm (ECL); 57.6cm (ICL); 60.3cm (RW); 42.5cm (LL); 42.9cm (LP); 20.6cm (CW); 22.1cm (CW) and 27.2cm (CD). The replacement of soybean meal by urea up to the level of 24 g/kg of dry matter in cactus pear “Orelha de Elefante Mexicana” based-diets, does not change the carcass morphometric characteristics of the finishing sheep.