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Page No. : 99-103

ABSTRACT

Chicken, chevon, mutton and pork samples were collected from various retail shops of Jammu to evaluate for standard plate count (SPC), psychrotrophic count (PTC), Enterococcus feacalis count (EFC), Staphylococcus aureus count (SAC), Escherichia coli count (ECC) and the presence of Salmonella spp. and Listeria monocytogenes. Poultry meat samples had higher(P<0.05) SPC, PTC, EFC and SAC than chevon, mutton and pork. E. coli was recovered from42.36% chicken, 29.32% mutton, 23.42% pork and 20.14% chevon samples. The prevalence rate of Salmonella spp. was 12.32% in poultry meat, compared to 6.24% in mutton, 4.86% in pork and 3.46% in chevon. L. monocytogenes was recovered only from 0.94% poultry samples. These findings indicated that poultry meat had higher microbial contamination with foodborne pathogens of potential zoonotic importance in comparison to chevon, pork and mutton.

Keywords: Chevon, Enterococcus, Escherichia coli, Listeria, microbiological quality, mutton,pork, poultry meat, Salmonella, Staphylococcus