Factors affecting the voluntary intake of food by cows

Abstract

In farming practice it is often difficult to get animals to eat the amounts of the lowpriced roughages which are desirable economically. Satisfactory levels of animal production can then be achieved only by the use of higher-priced foods. It is important, therefore, to understand the factors that control the voluntary intake of roughages. The probable importance of the filling effect of roughages in the reticulo-rumen has often been stressed (cf. Makela, 1956; Crampton, 1957), but apart from a few brief remarks by Schalk & Amadon (1928) there appears to be little direct experimental evidence for this probable effect.