Fatty Acid Composition of FatTail and Visceral Fat Depots from Chaal and Zandi Pure Bred Lambs and Their Crosses with Zel (Three Iranian Breeds)

The present study was done to evaluate the breed, sex and sampling site influence on fat-tail and visceral fatty acid composition of five pure and cross bred lambs from three Iranian sheep breeds. Particularly, on the content of saturated and unsaturated fatty acids from two cut-able fat depots (fat-tail and visceral). All animals were managed and finished up together and received the same diet. Statistically significant differ-ences (P 0.05 and P 0.01) in the proportions of some fatty acids were observed among breeds, genders and sampling sites. The values of unsaturated fatty acids (UFA) were significantly higher in fat-tail fat than in visceral (P 0.01). In addition, there was no significant difference in total amount of saturated fatty acids (SFA) in visceral and fat-tail fat tissue. The UFA and SFA of the two fat depots was not affected by sex (P 0.05). The result showed that SFA in Zel × Zandi, Chal × Chal and Zandi × Zandi lambs are more than the USF (P 0.05). In all the five groups, the most content of total saturated fatty acids (SFA) was made of palmetic acid (C16:0) and stearicacid (C18:0) and also, palmitoleic (C16:1 n7), oleic (C18:1) and linoleic acids (C18:2 n6) compromised most part of unsaturated fatty acids (UFA). However, the overall content of SFA and UFA was significantly affected by sampling site (P 0.01).