With increasing efforts to ban surgical castration, it is important to find ways to mask the level of boar taint in meat. The aim of this study was to test the possibility of masking boar taint or skatole levels by adding dried or and to evaluate consumer sensory preferences towards the skatole concentration in different carcass parts (; ; neck chop and subcutaneous fat) and the masking strategy (addition of or ). In the first experiment, the effect of the masking strategy was evaluated at three different skatole concentrations (0.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBoar taint is an unpleasant odour and flavour released during heat treatment of pork from uncastrated male pigs. The two main compounds responsible for boar taint are androstenone and skatole. Androstenone is a steroid hormone formed in the testis during sexual maturity.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe slaughtering of entire males increases the probability of incidence of tainted pork due to the presence two main compounds-androstenone and skatole. If a surgical castration of young entire male pigs is stopped in the EU countries, fattening of boars is likely to become one of the most commonly used systems in pig farming. Since skatole production and accumulation in fat tissue can be controlled by dietary approaches, several studies have investigated various feed additives to reduce this compound of boar taint.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study summarizes the knowledge about effects of bisphenol A (BPA) and its analogues on reproduction of pigs and some parameters of their offspring during period 2011-2020. Bisphenols are known as one of the most harmful environmental toxicants with endocrine-disrupting properties. One study in the reference period related to male reproductive system.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe aim of this exploratory work, because of the existing bias on the size of the sample and some of the sociodemographic characteristics of the participants, was to investigate the Eastern European consumers' beliefs and attitudes toward animal welfare, to perform a cross-country segmentation analysis and to observe possible differences with their Western European counterparts. For this purpose, a survey was conducted with 5508 consumers from 13 Eastern European countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Croatia, North Macedonia, Hungary, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Ukraine) using a questionnaire with nine statements about consumers beliefs regarding animal welfare (aspects of management, ethical issues about animals, and consequences of animal welfare on meat quality and price), one statement about the willingness to pay more for meat produced under better welfare conditions, and four statements regarding attitudes toward animal welfare. Differences between countries were detected for all the statements.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCastration of male piglets is a common practice to avoid boar taint but is being questioned. The present work has an exploratory character and aims to investigate the beliefs and attitudes of Eastern European consumers regarding boar taint, surgical castration immunocastration and perception of meat from castrated pigs and to find out possible segments of consumers regarding these attitudes and beliefs. For this purpose, a consumer study was carried out involving 5508 consumers from 13 Eastern European countries (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Croatia, North Macedonia, Hungary, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia and Ukraine).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe effects of addition of vitamin D(3) and vitamin E to pig diets on blood plasma calcium concentration, meat quality (longissimus muscle) and antioxidative capacity were investigated. Two treatments consisted of supplementation with vitamin D(3) (500,000IU/d) for 5 days separately (group D) and a combination of vitamin E (500mg α-tocopheryl acetate/kg diet) for 30 days and vitamin D(3) (500,000IU/d) for 5 days (group D+E) to growing-finishing pigs before slaughter. Pigs fed with vitamin D(3) had higher (P<0.
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