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Practical Approach to Calculation of Gastrointestinal Tract Fill¹

Department of Dairy Science, University of Wisconsin, Madison

ABSTRACT

It is well recognized that the amount of gut contents is an important factor regulating feed consumption in ruminants (2). Balch and Campling (2) concluded that "at least with diets consisting entirely or mainly of roughages, physical distension of the reticulo-rumen is an important factor, though probably not the only one, regulating voluntary intake."

Blaxter et al. (4) considered the amount of fill in the entire gastrointestinal tract to be the determinant of feed capacity in sheep. In this case, fill is defined as the amount of dry matter present in the gut at the end of a meal (from that meal and all previous meals). Further research is needed to determine whether reticulo-rumen fill alone, or fill of the entire gastrointestinal tract, is most closely related to a satiety signal when ruminants are consuming roughage diets.

One difficulty with the measurement of reticulo-rumen fill is that rumen-fistulated animals must be used (2).

¹ Published with the approval of the Director of the Wisconsin Agricultural Experiment Station.