STUDY THE EFFECT OF DOCKING IN IRAQI SHEEP:A-LAMB MEAT PRODUCTION

Fourty six (20 Awassi and 26 Hamdani) male lambs (4.93 kg birth wt.) were used in this experiment to study the effect of docking on growth and carcase characteristics. Fifty percent of three days old lambs were docked. The docked lambs gave 230 g , slightly higher daily body gain comparing with 220 g for the control lambs. Hamdani lambs gained significantly (p <0.05) higher daily body gain 260g when compared with the Awassi lambs 190g during the first 90 days when they reared with their dams. So they found to have the same ranking order in weaning body wt. (27.81 kg) (22.60 kg) or docked (25.69 kg) and control (24.73kg) lambs. All the lambs were fed after weaning for 90 days on a same concentrate ration. The best feed conversion rate was found for the docked lambs (4.94) comparing with the control lambs (5.52) and Awassi lambs (4.51) against the Hamdani lambs (6.22), leading to a nonsignificant final body wt (45.00 kg) for the docked lambs as compared with the control lambs (43.44 kg). While the Awassi lambs finished significantly (p<0.05) heavier 44.75kg than 43.69 kg of the Hamdani Lambs. No significant differences in carcase weight and killing out percentage between lambs from all groups were detected . Docking minimized significantly (p<0.05) the fat tail weight in Awassi (78%) and Hamdani (62%) lamb carcases. Kidney fat deposition, fat thickness on leg and 12th rib in docked lamb carcases increased significantly (p<0.05) comparing with the control lamb carcases. Hamdani lamb carcaes graded significantly (p<0.05) less than the Awassi. Control Awassi lamb carcases gave (27.02 %) significantly (p<0.05) higher fat tissue than the docked group lambs. Detecting the consumed ration cost from the total income of selling the gained live weight per lamb, docked lambs gave 16.92% net profit better than the Control lambs, and the Awassi lambs gained twice as the Hamdani lambs done.