Carcass characteristics and meat quality of lambs that are fed diets with palm kernel cake

Objective: The aim was to evaluate carcass characteristics, cut yield, and meat quality in lambs that were fed different inclusion levels of palm kernel cake. Methods: Forty-five woolless castrated male Santa $In{\hat{e}}s$ crossbred sheep with an initial average body weight of $23.16{\pm}0.35kg$ were used. The experimental design was a completely randomized design with five treatments, with palm kernel cake in the proportions of 0.0%, 7.5%, 15.0%, 22.5%, and 30.0% with nine replications per treatment. After slaughter, the gastrointestinal tract was weighed when it was full, after which it was then emptied. The heart, liver, kidney, pancreas perirenal fat were also collected and weighed. The carcass was split into two identical longitudinal halves and weighed to determine the quantitative and qualitative characteristics. Results: The empty body weight, carcass weight and yield, and fat thickness decreased linearly (p0.05) for the rib eye area of animals that were fed palm kernel cake. There was a reduction in the commercial cut weight (p0.05). The sarcomere length decreased linearly (p