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. 2014 Aug 28;5(1):42. doi: 10.1186/2049-1891-5-42

Table 3.

Effects of species, diet, and feed deprivation time (FDT) on the microbial counts (log 10 CFU/cm 2 ) on skin and carcass of sheep and goats

 
 Species
  
 Diet
  
 FDT
  
  
Response
 Goat
 Sheep
 P -value
 HD
 CD
 P -value
 12-hrs
 24-hrs
 P -value
 SE
n 16 16   16 16   16 16    
Skin, pre-holding1
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  E. coli count
 2.00
 2.21
 0.2129
 2.06
 2.16
 0.5527
  
  
  
  
  Total coliform count
 2.12b
 3.04a
 0.0011
 2.43
 2.73
 0.2413
  
  
  
  
  Aerobic plate count
 8.21b
 8.53a
 0.0305
 8.42
 8.31
 0.4511
  
  
  
  
Skin, pre-slaughtering2
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  E. coli count
 2.23b
 2.93a
 0.0118
 2.56
 2.60
 0.8650
 2.38
 2.78
 0.1238
 0.180
  Total coliform count
 2.26b
 3.01a
 0.0135
 2.60
 2.67
 0.8074
 2.42
 2.85
 0.1352
 0.197
  Aerobic plate count
 8.31
 8.30
 0.8017
 8.33
 8.28
 0.3198
 8.34
 8.28
 0.2163
 0.035
Carcass, pre-washing3
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  E. coli count
 2.28
 2.51
 0.2212
 2.34
 2.44
 0.6018
 2.28
 2.41
 0.8959
 0.134
  Total coliform count
 2.29
 2.56
 0.1999
 2.35
 2.50
 0.4587
 2.43
 2.43
 1.0000
 0.141
  Aerobic plate count 7.93 8.28 0.0718 8.16 8.04 0.5076 8.35a 7.85b 0.0128 0.131

HD = hay diet; CD = concentrate diet.

1Skin swabs from hind leg before depriving feed to experimental animals.

2Skin swabs from hind leg right before starting slaughtering.

3Carcass swabs from flank, brisket and leg regions right before washing after skinning and gut removed.

a,bWithin a row, least squares means that do not have a common superscript letter differ (P < 0.05).