The use of blood lactate concentration as an indicator of temperament and its impact on growth rate and tenderness of steaks from Simmental × Angus steers

• We evaluated blood lactate as an objective measurement of beef cattle temperament.
• All measures of temperament were significantly correlated to each other.
• Steers exiting the chute slower had lower carcass weights than steers leaving fast.
• Steers with medium blood lactate had higher shear values than high or low.
• Animal temperament contributes to variations in growth rate, blood lactate, and tenderness.

The objective of this study was to evaluate the use of blood lactate concentration as an objective measure of beef cattle temperament and determine if the temperament of steers affected growth rate and tenderness of beef steaks. Angus × Simmental steers (n = 154) were evaluated for blood lactate (BL), exit velocity (EV) and chute score (CS), and humanely harvested. Carcass characteristics were assessed and loin samples were obtained for tenderness evaluation. All measures of the temperament were significantly correlated to each other (r = 0.14–0.47; P ≤ 0.04). Steaks from steers in the medium BL classification were significantly more tender than steaks from steers from the high BL classification. The steers with faster EV tended to result in steaks with higher shear force values (P = 0.07). The steers classified as fast growing resulted in steaks with lower shear force values (P = 0.02) compared to steaks from steers classified as slow growing. Results suggest that the temperament contributes to variations in growth rate, blood lactate, and tenderness.