Effects of corn grain particle size and treated soybean meal on carcass and meat quality characteristics of beef steers finished on a corn silage diet.

Thirty-nine steers were distributed into a 2 x 2 factorial arrangement of treatments to determine the effect of corn grain particle size (cracked [CC] vs ground [GC] corn) and soybean meal treatment (solvent extracted soybean meal [SS] vs lignosulfonate treated soybean meal Soypass™ [SP]) on carcass and meat quality traits. When CC diet was supplemented with SS carcass quality grade score tended to decrease (P=0.09). GC had no effect on meat quality, while SP only increased the intramuscular fat content when added to CC (P=0.01). The CC diet supplemented with SP increased the proportion of saturated fatty acids (P=0.01). Despite the positive effects on carcass quality, the lack of improvement in meat quality and the more saturated fatty acid profile would not justify the use of processed corn or treated soybean meal in the finishing diet of steers.