Agriculture & Food, Volume 13, 2025

Rezumat: The aim of the experiment was to determine the effect of sex of domestic rabbit on carcass value and meat quality. For the purpose of the experiment, 30 rabbits of the large light silver breed were slaughtered in the ratio of 15 male and 15 female rabbits. At about 125 days of age, the last weighing and slaughter took place. After slaughter, the edible internal organs such as heart, kidneys and liver were weighed. The carcass itself was then weighed and then cut into subdivisions: back, head, front and thighs. From the samples of the back muscle of Longissimus thoracis et lumborum provided, the protein content, intramuscular fat and fatty acid content were determined in the laboratory. Females had a better growth performance compared to males, statistically significant at the significance level (P<0.01) higher carcass yield by 5% and a significant statistically significant difference of P<0.05 was observed in intramuscular fat content in muscle, where twice as much was recorded in females as in males. The weight of individual body parts, including viscera, was recorded higher in females than in males except for the lungs, which were heavier in males. Males were distinguished by a higher content of saturated fatty acids of the SFA group, determined in the muscle, whereas females were found to have a higher content of fatty acids of the PUFA group, unsaturated polyene fatty acids. The highest content of palmitic acid (43.20% and 38.26%, respectively), belonging to the SFA group, was found in the muscle of both sexes. The ratio between PUFA and SFA fatty acids was recorded as 0.26 and 0.41 in males and females, respectively.