Factors influencing difficulty of removing pelts from lamb carcasses

Forty-eight Suffolk x white-faced ram and wether lambs approximately 5, 7, or 9 mo of age were slaughtered to evaluate the effects of age and gender on difficulty of pelt removal, pelt damage, and leg damage. A commercial belt-type pelt puller and a scale that recorded force required to remove the pelt from the thickest part of the legs was used as lambs hung suspended from their front legs. Rams required more force (P less than .05) to remove the pelt than wethers, and the difference between genders became larger as age increased. Neither pelt damage due to grain crack nor leg damage judged by amount of fell and fat removed by the pelt puller changed with age. Rams possessed thicker pelts (P less than .05) than wethers; this plus a greater amount of collagen crosslinking in ram skins could be responsible for the slightly smaller amount of grain crack observed in ram pelts. Factors involved in difficulty of pelt removal in ram lambs included age, splenius weight, and overall maturity. Difficulty of pelt removal in wether lambs was best predicted by including age and splenius weight in the model. These data tend to support packers' common practice of discounting rams over 5 mo of age because rams develop masculine characteristics and become harder to dress with increasing age.