Table 2.

Effects of high stocking densities on variation in meat quality

No.	Species	Stocking densities	Position	Variation in meat quality	References
1	Chicken	28 birds/m2	Breast and thigh meat	The abdominal fat percentage and the fat content of thigh muscle declined	52
2	Chicken	23 and 26 birds/m2	Breast meat	Shear force in breast meat increased	132
3	Chicken	20, 25 and 30 birds/pen	Breast and wing meat	Final body, drumstick, breast, and wing weights linearly declined with stocking density	133
4	Chicken	18 birds/m2	Breast meat	Cooking loss and pH at 45 min decline; activity of lactate dehydrogenase increased	54
5	Chicken	18.6 birds/m2	Breast meat	Lightness at 45 min and 24 h after slaughter increased; drip loss at 24 h and 48 h increased	55
6	Chicken	18 birds/m2	Breast meat	Meat color b* declined	56
7	Chicken	20 birds/m2	Breast and thigh meat	Cooking loss and drip loss of breast and thigh muscles increased	134
8	Chicken	26 and 35 birds/m2	Breast meat	Cooking loss, meat color L* and a* at 48 h postmortem increased linearly with decreasing stocking density; ultimate breast pH and nitrogen content decreased linearly with decreasing stocking density	135
9	Chicken	18 birds/m2	Breast meat	pH at 24 h increased	136
10	Chicken	12 birds/m2	Breast meat	Breast weights declined	137
11	Chicken	22.5 birds/m2	Breast meat	pH values increased slightly as density increased	138
12	Chicken	37 kg/m2	Breast and thigh meat	Breast meat pH at 24 h, shear force, and cooking loss declined; thigh meat shear force increased	50
13	Chicken	25.3 and 30.4 birds/m2	Breast meat	Breast weights declined	139
14	Duck	9 birds/m2	Breast meat	Cooking loss increased	140
15	Geese	6.5 and 7.5 birds/m2	Breast meat	The intramuscular fat content of breast meat decreased linearly with decreasing stocking density	51
16	Duck	11 birds/m2	Breast meat	Drip loss and pH at 45 min declined	141