Japanese Wagyu A3

What is Japanese Wagyu?

Wagyu - a Japanese beef cattle breed derived from native Asian cattle. 'Wagyu' refers to all Japanese beef cattle, where 'Wa' means Japanese and 'gyu' means cow.

There are four breeds of wagyu descended From Japan

• Japanese Black - Imported
• Japanese Brown - Imported
• Japanese Polled - Not Imported
• Japanese Short Horned - Not Imported

Although “modern” breeding started in Japan in 1868, there is evidence of genetic separation in the wagyu strain dating back over 30,000 years. After the Meiji restoration in 1868, the democratic Japanese goverment wanted to introduce and promote western style eating habits and culture. This lead to the crossbreeding of the native Japanese cattle (wagyu) with imported western cattle (Devon, Short Horn, Simmental, and others). The Japanese's western cattle crossbreeding program ceased in 1910.

Wagyu Cattle were first imported into the United States by Morris Whitney in 1976, which included two black and two red (Japanese Brown) bulls. The importation of both black and red wagyu continued until the 1990s, after which the Japanese government banned exports of Japanese Wagyu genetics.