Effect of Breeds on the Relationship between Beef Marbling Standard and Fat Percentage in Ribeye of Beef

Effects of breed on the relationship between Beef Marbling Standard (BMS) number by the examiners and ratio of fat area to ribeye area (RFA) calculated by image analysis were investigated. Pictures of the ribeye area of 32 Japanese Black (JB), 5 Aberdeen Angus (AA), 7JB×Holstein (BH), 11JB×AA (BA) and 3 JB×Murray Grey (BM) were used. Averages and standard deviations for the area of marbling particle, and numbers of marbling particle were calculated for marbling particles with their areas greater than 0.01, 0.05, 0.1, 0.5 and 1.0cm2. Standard deviations of marblingpercentage for small areas which were obtained by dividing the ribeye into 4, 9, 25 and 100 partitions were calculated by the image analysis method. The average and standard deviation of marbling particle area for JB, AA and BM tended to be lower than those for BA and BH. The number of marbling for JB was smaller than those for other 4 breeds. The dispersion of marbling for JB and BM tended to be uniform compared with those for other 3 breeds. RFA for JB was significantly lower than those for other 4 breeds in BMS number 2 and 3.