Ruminants 1

Question 1

What does the order Arteriodactyla mean?

Answer 1

-the even toed ungulates

Question 2

What is the suborder of ruminants?

Answer 2

ruminantia

Question 3

Where does the word ruminant come from?

Answer 3

-Latin
-meaning to chew again referring to cud-chewing exhibited by ruminants

Question 4

What do ruminants do that other herbivores don’t?

Answer 4

-regurgitate feed for repeated chewing

Question 5

Why are ruminants important?

Answer 5

-Capable of utilizing fibrous feedstuffs
-less competition for food with humans
-Agriculture importance
-Food production for humans

Question 6

How do ruminants have lass competition for food with humans?

Answer 6

-they are herbivores
-can be supported on vegetation from land that can’t support other crops

Question 7

Why do ruminants have an agriculture importance?

Answer 7

-sheep domestication 11,000 years ago
-goats 9,000 years ago
-cattle 8,500 years ago

Question 8

How are ruminants important to food production for humans?

Answer 8

-meat, milk, fiber, work (draft)
-940 million - 1.4 billion cattle (second most abundant)
-1 billion sheep (third most)
-720 million goats ( fifth most)
-other domesticated ruminants: buffalo, camels, alpacas, llama, reindeer, yaks

Question 9

How have ruminants, specifically cattle, adapted?

Answer 9

-cattle have adapted world wide
-artic great utilization of reindeer and yaks
-wet, tropical area more buffalo

Question 10

How have ruminants, specifically in drier areas, adapted?

Answer 10

-sheep
-goats
-camels

Question 11

Where have alpacas and llamas adapted to?

Answer 11

Central and South America

Question 12

What are the ruminant feeding types?

Answer 12

-Concentrate selectors or browsers
-Grass and roughage eaters
-Intermediate, mixed feeder

Question 13

What are concentrate selector or browser feeders?

Answer 13

-select highly nutritious plants or selective of the highly nutritious plant parts and high digestible
-many deer

Question 14

What grass and roughage eaters?

Answer 14

-Ability to digest more fibrous plant material than concentrate selectors
-grazing, grass eating species
-cattle, sheep: domestic and wild bison, African antelope

Question 15

What are intermediate, mixed feeders?

Answer 15

-Characteristics of both types
-potential for seasonal changes in diet that result in changes in feeding type
-Elk, caribou

Question 16

What is the main characteristic of a ruminant?

Answer 16

-4 chambers or compartments

Question 17

What are the four compartments of the ruminant stomach?

Answer 17

-rumen
-reticulum
-omasum
-abomasum

Question 18

What side of a cow is the rumen on?

Answer 18

The left

Question 19

What is the reticulum?

Answer 19

-not separated completely from rumen
-aids in movement of food into the rumen or omasum
-regurgitation of bolus during rumination
-collects hardware and prevents movement
-honeycomb

Question 20

What is the rumen?

Answer 20

-fermentation vat
-muscular walls aid in the mixing and movement of content (rumination)
-Absorption of VFAs and NH3 through rumen wall

Question 21

How does the fermentation vat in the rumen work?

Answer 21

-allows digestion of plant cell wall biomass
-main site of fermentation: reticulo-rumen (fermentation chamber)
-ANAEROBIC: low to no O2

Question 22

How does the rumen absorb VFAs and NH3 through rumen wall?

Answer 22

-surface covered in papillae
-absorptive structures for VFAs

Question 23

What is the omasum?

Answer 23

-between rumen and reticulum
-content must flow through to reach abomasum
-may be involved in particle size reduction and water absorption

Question 24

What is the abomasum?

Answer 24

-connected to omasum
-functions similarly to glandular stomach of non-ruminants
-mucus, HCl, enzymes, secreted to initiate digestion

Question 25

What are the four steps of rumination?

Answer 25

-regurgitation
-remastication
-reensalivation
-reswallowing

Question 26

How many hours a day do ruminants ruminate?

Answer 26

-about 8 hours a day

Question 27

Do fibrous material cause longer rumination?

Answer 27

Yes, fibrous material stimulate longer rumination time, longer retention

Question 28

What is the origin of rumination?

Answer 28

-not clear
-some think that it is a survival means of early ruminant: eat and hide

Question 29

What is eructation?

Answer 29

-belching
-gas from microbial fermentation (12-30L of gas)

Question 30

What layers form in the rumen?

Answer 30

-gases on top
-today’s hay in the middle
-grain and yesterday hay on the bottom

Question 31

Sequence of food through a ruminant?

Answer 31

1. rumen
2. reticulum
3. esophagus
4. omasum
5. abomasum

Question 32

What does the rumen contain? do?

Answer 32

-there are sacks and structures that help with mixing
-muscle contract

Question 33

When a ruminant is new to the world how does its digestive system work?

Answer 33

-limited rumen development at birth
-milk-fed neonates, no need for fiber digestion
-with development and change in diet, the rumen increases
-eventually overwhelming volume of the stomach is rumen

Question 34

What is the major compartment at birth?

Answer 34

-abomasum

Question 35

Where do esophageal grooves route milk to?

Answer 35

-the acidic stomach

Question 36

when does the rumen start to dominant on volume?

Answer 36

3-4 months

Question 37

How do feeds influence rumen development?

Answer 37

-influences the development of rumen papillae
-feeds that produce more VFA stimulate papillae development
-the presence of VFA, papillae expand and increase in size