Study Of Bacteria In Sheep’s Rumen

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30769, 5 June 1965, Page 8

Study Of Bacteria In Sheep’s Rumen

AN investigation of the bacx terial population in the rumen of sheep is to be started in the biochemistry department at Lincoln College as a result of a grant of £l9OO which has been made to Professor B. H. Howard, professor of biochemistry at the college, by the Nuffield Foundation. This grant has been made for one year and the project will continue for at least two years with a smaller grant being required in the second year. This will be a continuation of work begun by Professor I Howard when he was at the

' Rowatt Research Institute in Aberdeen before he came to New Zealand. He was then studying the biochemistry of rumen bacteria and protozoa in the sheep, and in particular the way in which rumen micro organisms decompose ; the carbohydrates in the feed of the animal. Because the sheep was so important in Canterbury, ProI fessor Howard said, it seemed ; that there was an opportun- ; ity to continue this work ; here. As the food that the ! ruminant ate was subjected I to the action of the rumen i bacteria before it passed into ; the ordinary digestive system ; of the animal Professor How- ' ard said that the biochemical ; action of these organisms was II of the greatest importance in

the sheep’s utilisation of its feed.

The purpose of the study would initially be to determine what types of bacteria were present in the rumen, and to look at their effects on various types of feed and feed constituents. On the basis of studies at overseas research institutes, the type of micro-organisms found in the rumen varied according to the diet of the animal, so they would be wanting to find out what organisms were present in the rumen Where the sheep was fed on an ordinary Canterbury pasture. Professor Howard said it was hoped to look at the response of rumen micro organisms to sudden changes in the sheep’s diet. It was a well-known farming phenomenon that it was not desirable to switch animals suddenly from one diet to another. One reason was that it took time for the bacterial population in the rumen to adjust itself to cope with the change from one food to another.

The fermentation process brought about by the rumen micro-organisms determined the nature of the products on which the host animal had to make its tissue, so that carcase composition was to some extent dependent on the activity of the organisms which he would be investigating. From a bacteriological point of view. Professor Howard said, the isolation and cultivation of the bacteria from the rumen were particularly difficult and required a high degree of skill on the part of the bacteriologist. | Part of the Nuffield grant I will be devoted to employament of a bacteriologist who ■will need to have had considerable experience. Work with the rumen will have to be done in the absence of air as conditions in the rumen are anaerobic (lacking in air). Part of the object of the work is to use organisms isolated from the rumen as material on which investigations of problems of a more fundamental biochemical interest can be made as part of the department’s general teaching and research programme.