Wyandot County Republican. [volume] (Upper Sandusky, Ohio) 1869-1903, 1871-02-23
The Organs of Digestion I'm Cattle.

The food received by all animals affords, |
by the process of digestion, a nutritious |
fluid of a milky color, called chyle, which |
is absorbed into the system, and soon en-
tiers the circulating mass of blood, and
becomes itself converted into blood
thereby repairing the waste that this fluid
suffers in nourishing the body, and also
supplying the materials for all the strange
ly various secretions. The organs of di-
gestion in neat cattle are more complicated
than in the horse, or in man. for the lat
ter have only one stomach, but these have
four stomachs. This probably renders
them more liable, particularly in. their
| present domesticated state, to disease of
| the digestive organs.
The gullet is thick, fieshy canal, that
receives the food from the mouth, in its
passage into the first stomach, and having
afterw ards returned it to the mouth for
| the purpose of re-mastication, once more
receives it, and conveys it into a canal at
| its base.
The grass is cropped, and having been
slightly chewed, is covered by the mucus
of the mouth, and formed by the tongue
into kind of pellet that can be swallow
ed. 1t then passed down the gullet, and
arrives at this canal. If this canal were
pursued, it would lead ON to the naGnypltes,
l
constructed. 1t is formed of two rounded
muscular bands, which may be held to-
gether or divided-which may form tube
through which liquid will scarcely pene-
trate, and so carry on the food to the third
stomach, or which may divide and suffer
it to fail through into the rumeN, or
paunch, of the roof of which, and also of
the reticulum, or second stomach, these
bands form part.
The pellet of food passes down, and
partly by its own weight, and assisted by
the contraction of the muscles of the gul.
let, and its course also, in some measure
depending on the pleasure of the animal
it breaks through the floor and enters into
} the paunch; and there it remains, and
pellet after pellet descends until the paunch
! is quite filled. The animal then lies com
fortably down. The food has all this
time been macerating in the paunch
, the inner membrance of which is lined
, with numerous little prominences or ca
pillary glands that secrete an nalkaline fluid
which prevents or limits the process oi
fermentation, when fresh succulent vege
tables are exposed to the united influence
of warmth and moisture. While this ha!
been going forward, the muscles which
compose one of the coats of the pauncl
t have been constantly acting, and the foot
has travelled through the various compart
! ments of the stomach, and every portion
I of it has been exposed to the influence o
this fluid and finally, that which wa
g swallowed first, or which had been in tn
r stomach many an hour before, and whicl
q has been considerably softened, and dull
e prepared, is ready to present itself first t
e be returned.
|, By slight convulsive act, portion SUI
t ficient to form pellet of the proper siz
/. to be returned, passes on from the paunc
It into the second stomach, which is col
e nected with the first under the floor of th
II canal. This stomach is possessed of
k strongly muscular coat, and it contract
e Immediately on this mass, presses out tn
o fluid which it contains, and sends it alon
l. the canal through the third into the fourt
A stomach at the same time it forms tt
a more solid part into proper shape to
10 returned, and covers it with mucl
le fluid, provided by numerous little glant
in the honeycomb shells, and whiC
le renders the return through the gullet mo
)r easy.
al By another slight convulsive effort
II the animal, the pellet is made to bres
D. through the floor of the canal, and is Ca
at ried to the base of the gullet, where it
a embraced by the spiral muscles of th
IL tube, andreturned to the mou tn or it ms
$, be more correctly said that the san
~ effort which sends the prepared pell
le from the second stomach into the gullet,
eS be re-chewed, forces fresh portion fro
ID the paunch into the second stomach. t
OF animal now ruminates at his leisure, a.
rs the pellet having been perfectly brok
n, n, down by the grinding action of the teet
I'll and softened by an additional secreti,
IN from the glands of the mouth, isSalmos
es semi-fuid mass; and when it is aga
In swallowed, it either has not sutffcie
NJ solidity to force itself through the floor
g the canal, or the beast docs not choC
Up that it shall, and it passes on, over the II
ct of the paunch and the honey comb, a
Id enters into the third stomach or mar
plies.-An.ericd7a Stock Journal