What kind of animals are pigs, horses, cattle and sheep, and how do their food and digestive physiology differ?
The Chinese zodiac, also called the animal signs, consists of twelve animals matched with the twelve Earthly Branches according to a person's year of birth, including the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog and pig.So what kind of animals are the pig, horse, cattle and sheep among them? What do they all eat? How do their digestive physiology characteristics differ?
What kind of animals are pigs, horses, cattle and sheep?
Pig: a omnivorous meat-type domestic animal of the class Mammalia, order Artiodactyla, family Suidae, genus Sus;
Horse: a herbivorous domestic animal of the class Mammalia, order Perissodactyla, family Equidae, genus Equus;
Cattle: class Mammalia, order Artiodactyla, suborder Ruminantia, family Cavicornia, subfamily Bovinae;
Sheep: class Mammalia, order Artiodactyla)., suborder Ruminantia)., family Cavicornia, subfamily Bovinae, genus Ovis., genus Capra.
What do pigs, horses, cattle and sheep all eat?
1. Besides pig feed, the grasses pigs love to eat most are lamb's quarters, chicken-claw grass, plantain and pig sprout grass. They also like eating apples, and potatoes are also a favorite of pigs.
2. Besides eating green grass, dry hay, wheat straw and other roughage, the horse must also be fed concentrated feed, namely feed beans, wheat and wheat bran, so that it has the strength to do heavy work.
3. Cattle are vegetarian animals with a very wide food range; they like eating green grass most, and also like eating some green plants (or fruits), such as water spinach, sweet potato vines (seedlings), corn (seedlings), rice, wheat seedlings and so on.
4. Sheep eat many kinds of grass, and the grasses they like to eat can be divided into the following categories:
(1) By type of forage
Sheep love eating leguminous forage with high nutritional value, such as Chinese milk vetch, yellow sweet clover, clover and so on, and do not like eating rice straw, thatch grass, reeds and so on.
(2) By shape of forage
Sheep love eating grass with relatively wide and thin leaves that has no thorns, such as sweet potato leaves, mulberry leaves and so on; sheep mostly do not like eating grass with pointed leaves, such as sand grass, smooth cordgrass, pine needles and so on.
(3) By growth stage of forage
Sheep love eating tender green grass before the flowering stage, and do not like eating withered old grass after the flowering stage.
(4) By plant part of the forage
Sheep love eating the upper parts of the forage, especially the upper parts bearing seeds. They do not like eating the coarse old grass near the roots.
In winter there is little green grass, so sheep can eat dry hay. Dry hay can also serve as forage on rainy days. The method for making dry hay is to choose a sunny day, cut the green grass and spread it out to dry, turning it often; generally it can be dried after 2-3 days of sunning. The dried grass should be tied into bundles and stacked in a high, dry place, and should also be covered with rice straw on top to prevent rain from making the hay moldy.
How do the digestive physiology characteristics of pigs, horses, cattle and sheep differ?
1. Digestive physiology characteristics of pigs: pigs are monogastric omnivorous domestic animals, with an underdeveloped cecum, and the capacity of the digestive tract is also limited. Food digestion mainly relies on chemical digestion, while the digestive role of microorganisms is relatively small. Therefore, feeding pigs with appropriate concentrated feed is more suitable than using large amounts of green and coarse feed.
2. Digestive physiology characteristics of horses: horses have a small stomach capacity, long intestines with a large volume, and a particularly well-developed cecum and colon. The cecum of a horse can reach a capacity of 37 liters, accounting for about 16% of the total capacity of the digestive tract; the cecum contains large numbers of microorganisms whose function is similar to the rumen of ruminant domestic animals.
3. Digestive physiology characteristics of cattle and sheep: cattle and sheep have four stomachs, namely the rumen, reticulum, omasum and abomasum. The first three stomachs are collectively called the forestomach; they do not secrete gastric juice, and only the abomasum has gastric glands that secrete gastric juice. Its digestive function mainly depends on microbial activity; these microorganisms (bacteria, ciliates and fungi) decompose the cellulose in the feed step by step, ultimately forming acetic acid, propionic acid, butyric acid and other lower volatile fatty acids; the decomposition of cellulose in the forestomach can provide 60%-70% of the energy needed by the body. Microorganisms can also use non-protein nitrogenous substances in the feed to synthesize bacterial protein, which after entering the abomasum is digested and decomposed by the gastrointestinal tract into amino acids, and after absorption enters the bloodstream to be absorbed and utilized.