Effects of whole silage Chenopodium quinoa on amino acids and fatty acids in muscle of small-tail Han sheep

Quinoa (Chenopodium quinoa) is rich in amino acids, fatty acids, minerals, and free sugars. To explore the influence of feeding small-tail-cold sheep quinoa silage, the muscle’s amino and fatty acid contents were determined using chloroform/methanol extraction and an automatic amino acid analyzer. Sixty healthy small-tailed-cold sheep with a body weight of (22.0 ± 1.5) kg were divided into 5 groups with 12 sheep in each group. The control group (Ⅰ) was fed with whole corn, and the experimental groups (Ⅱ, Ⅲ, Ⅳ, and Ⅴ) were fed with whole corn containing 3%, 6%, 9%, and 12% quinoa silage, respectively. The experiment lasted for 80 days. The results showed that 17 different amino acids were detected in the muscle; 7 essential amino acids and 10 non-essential amino acids. Compared with the control group, the contents of total amino acids, essential amino acids, umami amino acids, and sweet amino acids were higher in the experimental groups. Additionally, 28 different fatty acids, 13 saturated and 15 unsaturated, were detected. Compared with the control group, the saturated fatty acid content decreased, polyunsaturated fatty acid content increased, and the content of amino and fatty acids associated with flavor increased. We concluded that feeding the sheep purple quinoa silage increased the amino and fatty acid contents and the nutritional value of meat and influenced the flavour.