Nutrition In Ruminants

Cows and some other plant-eating animals swallow their food after chewing once. Later,
they bring back the swallowed food into the mouth and chew it again. A plant-eating
animal that brings back swallowed food into the mouth to chew it again is called a
ruminant and the process is called rumination.
This habit of plant-eating animals makes their digestive system different from ours and
thus the need to study them separately.

Ruminants actually have a compound stomach and it works in a simple process.......

There are 4 parts to this process they are Ingestion, Digestion, Absorption and Egestion

Ingestion

The food is ingested with the help of the tongue and chewed. Ruminants have sharp incisors and
large molars to bite and chew grass. They also have powerful jaw muscles.

Digestion

After being chewed once, the food passes down the 2 to 3 feet long oesophagus. The oesophagus
leads into the stomach. The stomach of ruminants has four chambers: rumen, reticulum,
omasum, and abomasum.
Rumen: The rumen helps in storing the large quantities of food that has been quickly consumed.
The food is partially digested here and is now called the cud. The cud is then brought back to the
mouth, re-chewed, and re-swallowed in a process called cud-chewing. The rumen has billions of
bacteria and protozoa, which break down the carbohydrate called cellulose found in hay and
grass.
Reticulum: The reticulum helps in moving the swallowed food back into the mouth for thorough
chewing. The reticulum opens into the omasum.
Omasum: The omasum absorbs excess water.
Abomasum: The walls of the abomasum secrete digestive juices.

Absorption

Absorption begins in the four-chambered stomach, but the main absorptive organs are the
intestines. The food from the abomasum passes into the small intestine, where it mixes with
secretions from the pancreas and liver. Most of the digestion of- carbohydrates, proteins, and fats
takes place here. Several villi are present here, which help in increasing the surface area for
absorption.
The small intestine leads into the large intestine. The main function of the large intestine is to
absorb water and eliminate the undigested food as faeces.

There is this common question among people....How is the human’s stomach different from a
Ruminants Stomach......Well I have a answer for this question.

The ruminants digestive system is not at all like the human digestive system. The
main difference between the human digestive system and the Ruminant's
digestive system is simple: Ruminants have a stomach that consists of four
compartments, commonly referred to as four stomachs ruminants spend the
better part of the day eating, swallowing and regurgitating their food, and
chewing it again before final digestion. Because a ruminant's teeth mostly grind
their food, ruminants use their tongues – which is why they are so long – to help
them gather and grasp grass for pinching off between their incisors and dental
pad at the front part of their mouths.The main difference between man and cow –
besides having two more legs and eating only grass – lies in the cow's stomach.
Cows have a ruminant system with four distinctive sections: the rumen, the
reticulum, the omasum and the abomasum, while humans have
a monogastric stomach with one chamber. The cow digestive system allows
herbivores to graze and consume grass until they are full. The uneaten grass goes
into the rumen and the reticulum sections. Later the cow coughs up –
regurgitates – a bit of the grass called cud to chew it again. Being coarse, grass
does not break down easily in the stomach, which is why cows have a digestive
system that allows them to regurgitate their cud to chew it more thoroughly
before it enters the last two stomach sections, the omasum and the abomasum,
for final digestion
Well If you have read this whole presentation until now then Thank you for giving me a moment of your time
I really appreciate it