How does a cow eat?

Answer 1

A cow uses its strong rough tongue to grab and teeth to shear (which are only on the bottom row). Then the product the cow eats goes into the rumen to be fermented. It then is regurgitated and chews as cud. The cud is reswallowed, refermented in the rumen, then goes through the rest of the digestive tract for nutrients to be absorbed into the cow's system, before exiting as feces.

Answer 2

A cow wraps her strong rough tongue around the feed or grass and pulls it into her mouth. The lower teeth act as shearers, cutting off most of what the cow cannot fit into her mouth. They're not entirely that sharp, so both moving the head in a backwards or sideways motion also helps, followed by chewing with the molars--especially with rough forages like hay and mature grasses-- will keep in what the cow wants to eat and what she wants to "spit" out. Cows only have incisors (front teeth) on the lower jaw, and has no teeth on the top, just a hard palate.

Cows will spend more time chewing more dry and long-stemmed feed like hay, straw, greenfeed, or even tall, mature grasses they've grazed than they would high-moisture forages like grass, legumes, or grain, the latter they tend to "inhale" or "vacuum up" like a bunch of Hoover (or Dyson®) vacuum cleaners. She may spend several seconds to chew down the feed before swallowing and going in for the next bite, particularly with hay.

(Interesting note: Young, pre-weaned calves tend to spend more time chewing their food than they do when they get to about weaning age and beyond that into adulthood. That's why grains can be fed whole to pre-weaned calves, but not post-weaned calves or adult cattle.)

Cows will take a bite from a pasture about every 1.00 to 1.10 seconds. (It's easy to time how many bites a cow will make in 10 or 30 seconds; just set the clock to a certain time interval and then count how many bites she takes. Then divide the number of bites by the time taken in the test interval.)

The partly-chewed forage ends up in the first and largest forestomach, the rumen, where it begins fermentation. Once the cow is full, she burps or regurgitates up some of what she has eaten, while resting, and chews it again as cud. This process repeats several times over the time of a couple of hours or so of resting (standing or laying down). The rechewed digesta is refermented in the rumen, then passes through the rest of the digestive tract being broken down further and nutrients absorbed until it is excreted as feces.

The cow doesn't have just the rumen as a forestomach. There are two additional forestomachs, which are the reticulum (the "hardware" stomach) and the omasum (liquid absorber stomach), before we get to the true stomach which is the abomasum. The abomasum is not much different from ours or from a horse's, secreting the same acids and performing the same purpose as in any other animal, human or non-human.

Answer 3

cows dont graze themselvs what are you all stupid

Answer 4

Because they have a large stomach that needs to be kept satisfied all the time, plus they have high nutritional demands depending on their age, reproductive status and body condition.

Answer 5

With their mouth.

Cattle are herbivores and technically don't have 'prey' but the above answer is correct. They eat grasses with their mouth.

Answer 6

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