Abstract
To accommodate an increased food intake with greater body size, rumen–reticulum capacity must become larger to allow heavier digesta loads. Recently, digesta load was found to correlate with age more strongly than body size. It was suggested that older animals had compromised mastication efficiency due to tooth wear and compensated for larger particles by increasing rumen–reticulum capacity to extend retention time. Herein, we constructed models and used Akaike Information Criteria corrected for small sample size to determine if digesta load was related with age or body weight in 80 female and 105 male black-tailed deer (Odocoileus hemionus columbianus). We also assessed if the presence of fetuses influenced relationships in females. Females were collected in spring, 1985–1988, and males were collected in autumn, 1980, 1982–1984, and 1988, from Hopland Research and Extension Center, Mendocino County, California. Digesta loads, fetuses, and carcasses were weighed, and animal ages were estimated. Digesta load was related to age in females and body weight in males. Our study shows that body size and age-related factors may both influence rumen–reticulum capacity.
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Acknowledgments
This research was funded by the California Agricultural Experimental Station, California Department of Fish and Game, HREC, Alamo Safari Club, and A. Starker Leopold Endowed Chair. Our gratitude goes out to A. Murphy, R. Timm, T. Blankenship, K. Mayer, R. Mohr, E. Loft, J. Booth, R. Keiffer, B. Whittaker, C. Bryne, M. O’Bryan, T. Kucera, P. Beier, W. Carmen, P. Mulligan, R. Evett, K. Arha, J. Garcia, G. Fong, K. Gleason, N. Menzies, L. Branch, and L. Merkle for assistance in data collection. The cooperation over the years of numerous public hunters was essential to the project and we are grateful. A special thanks to J. Duarte for commenting on earlier drafts of the manuscript. This research was conducted under animal use protocols approved by the University of California, Berkeley and Davis, and HREC, and a memorandum of understanding and collecting permits from the California Fish and Game Commission.
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Duarte, A., McCullough, D.R. & Weckerly, F.W. Does rumen–reticulum capacity correlate with body size or age in black-tailed deer?. Eur J Wildl Res 57, 1131–1136 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-011-0525-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-011-0525-y