Table 1.

Effects of the dietary probiotic E. faecium on the pH and colour of pectoral muscles of 42-day-old AA broiler chickens (mean ± S.D.) ^*

Index	Control	E. faecium	p value
pH at 45 min post mortem	6.15 ± 0.26a	6.57 ± 0.17b	0.018
pH at 24 h post mortem	5.77 ± 0.10a	6.11 ± 0.13b	0.008
Meat colour at 45 min post mortem
Lightness	45.56 ± 0.28a	43.61 ± 0.52b	0.002
Redness	1.75 ± 0.23a	1.47 ± 0.11a	0.117
Yellowness	5.08 ± 0.44a	4.55 ± 0.10a	0.096
Meat colour at 24 h post mortem
Lightness	49.29 ± 1.29a	48.60 ± 0.28a	0.248
Redness	1.20 ± 0.07a	1.21 ± 0.37a	0.959
Yellowness	5.72 ± 0.17a	4.18 ± 0.21b	0.001

*Data of the same row with different letters (a or b) are significantly different at p<0.05.