An experiment was conducted to evaluate the effects of five concentrate levels as dry matter basis (25.0, 37.5, 50.0, 62.5 and 75.0%) and two diet balance methods on the digestive tract, internal organs weight and gastrointestinal fill of 45 crossbred F1 Limousin x Nelore young bulls, averaging 14 months of age and initial live weight of 330 kg. One diet balance method was almost isoprotein with 12% of crude protein and the other was attempted to attend the metabolizable protein requirements of animals. The animals were full fed up to the slaughter weight of 500 kg. The coastcross grass hay was used as roughage source in the diet. A completely randomized design in a 5 x 2 factorial arrangement, with four replicates, was used. The two diet balance methods resulted in equal animal performances and any connect with concentrate levels was found. The gastrointestinal fill and omasum weight decreased and liver and internal fat weight linearly increased as concentrate levels increased. The others parameters were not influenced by the concentrate levels.
growth; diet; organs and viscera
