Variation in Shear Force, Cooking Loss, pH, and Sarcomere Length of Eight Different Muscles Collected from Australian...

Goat meat is often underutilised, partly due to inconsistent eating quality and limited information on variation between individual cuts or muscles. This study established a quality baseline for eight muscles from intact male Australian Rangeland goats by comparing cooking loss, shear force, ultimate pH and sarcomere length. The longissimus thoracis et lumborum, psoas major, semitendinosus, semimembranosus, adductor femoris, triceps brachii, rectus femoris and vastus lateralis muscles were sampled from 25 carcasses. Analysis demonstrated significant muscle effects for all quality traits (p < 0.05). Shear force ranged from 29.2 N in vastus lateralis to 50.2 N in semitendinosus, indicating substantial variation in tenderness. Sarcomere length varied from 1.50 to 1.99 µm, while cooking loss ranged from 12.5 to 19.4%. Ultimate pH was consistently high (6.14-6.33), reflecting the susceptibility of Australian Rangeland goats to this outcome. Exploratory correlation analysis demonstrated strong positive relationships and substantial concordance for ultimate pH across multiple muscles, indicating that it was highly consistent throughout the carcass. Principal component analysis found ultimate pH contributed most strongly to chevon quality variation, accounting for the largest proportion of total variation (30.5%), followed by cooking loss (17.2%) and tenderness-related traits (11.8%). These findings provide a foundational benchmark for Australian Rangeland goats and support targeted muscle utilisation, value-adding processing and the development of cuts-based marketing strategies to improve product consistency and consumer acceptance.