Effects of dietary vitamin E supplementation on performance and meat characteristics in fattening bulls from the Belgian Blue breed

An experiment was conducted to study effects of dietary vitamin E supplemen tation on animal performance, slaughter characteristics and meat quality tr aits in Belgian Blue double-muscled bulls. Two groups of six bulls each wer e offered (close to ad libitum) a fattening diet based on sugar beet pulp f or 154 days, at which time they were slaughtered. The diet given to the con trol group (CG) contained 12.5 mg vitamin E/kg concentrate. The vitamin E-t reated group (VG) received the same concentrate plus a supplement of 1000 m g vitamin E per bull daily. Steaks from m. longissimus thoracis were used t o determine meat quality characteristics, alpha tocopherol concentration an d thiobarbituric acid reactive substances content (TBARS), an indicator of oxidation rancidity. Supplementation had no influence on animal performance or carcass characteristics. The main findings were that vitamin E doubled the muscle alpha tocopherol level (1.9 vs. 0.9 mg/kg; P < 0.001), lipid oxi dation was suppressed as indicated by TEARS values (P < 0.01 at days 7, 9, 11 and 14 after slaughter), but muscle colour was not significantly affecte d although a* (redness) tended to be higher for VG. (C) 2000 Elsevier Scien ce B.V. All rights reserved.