Observations on carcass and meat quality in duroc, landrace and duroc x landrace pigs

There has been much recent interest 1n the Duroc as a possible ‘third breed’ in the UK. In particular, claims have been made that meat obtained from Durocs has high eating quality because of raised levels of intramuscular (marbling) fat. In practice, the Duroc 1s likely to be used 1n crosses involving the ‘white’ breeds. Therefore, in this study, carcass and meat quality were examined 1n Duroc, Landrace and Duroc x Landrace pigs produced contemporaneously. Twenty-one entire males from each of the breed types were used. Landrace pigs were from a long-established Nucleus population of British Landrace. The Durocs were from a selected Nucleus line, originally established from an importation from Canada 1n 1968, expanded and improved by subsequent North American importations and then extensively upgraded by frozen semen from the USA over the period 1980-85 using a wide range of sires. The D x L progeny were produced alongside the purebreds in the Nucleus. All pigs were fed ad libitum on a ration containing 13.8 MJ DE, 200g crude protein and lOg lysine per kg and slaughtered at approximately 80 kg live weight at the IFR abattoir following a standard pre-slaughter procedure.