Digestive system is concerned directly

with:
1. Prehension
2. Mastication
3. Digestion
4. Absorption
5. Expulsion of the undigested portion.

Digestive system consists of :

1.Digestive tract consists of a
muscular tube lined with mucus
membrane that is continuous with the
external skin at the mouth and at the
anus.
2. Accessory glands-salivary glands,
liver, pancreas.

General structure of digestive tract:

The wall of digestive tract comprises of 4 walls.
1. Tunica Mucosa-innermost layer. Closest to
the lumen. It is composed of epithelium cells,
connective tissues and smooth muscles.
2. Tunica submucosa-Immediately outer to T.
mocosa. Made up of loose connective tissues.
Blood vessels and nerves are found in this
layer.

3. Tunica muscularis-Next to the T.

submucosa. Well developed layer of
muscles.
4. Tunica serosa-The outermost layer.
Visceral peritoneum with a thin layer of
connective tissue under it.

Organs
Organs involved are:
1. Mouth
2. Pharynx
3. Esophagus
4. Stomach/forestomac
5. Small intestine
6. Large intestine
7. Accessory glands (salivary glands, liver,
pancreas etc.)

Used primarily for holding, grinding and

mixing food. It is also used to manipulate
the environment (grasping) and
defensive/offensive weapon.
Structure making up the mouth is lips,
teeth, tongue, cheek and cheek muscles.
Glands near the mouth:
mainly salivary glands which are of four
types- parotid, mandibular and sublingual.

Lips-entrance into the mouth. Appearance

and mobility varies among species.
Lips are densely innervated by sensory
fibers making them very sensitive tactile
organ.
Lips of sheep,goats horses are soft and
flexible making them the organ of
prehension.
Lips in cattle and pigs are stiffer and less
mobile.

All mammals have four kinds of teethincisors, canines, premolars, and molar.
Mamals are heterodonty meaning that
they have various types of teeth that
are specialized for different aspects of
prehension and mastication.

The incisors -cutting the food. Ruminants

lack upper incissors-has dental pad in its
place.
Premolars and molars -crushing
/grinding
The canines -tearing the food/flesh
(poorly developed in man but are well
developed in other mammals such as
great cats)
Milk teeth temporary teeth of young falls
off later on replaced by Permanent teeth
last for long time

Mass of muscles covered with mucus

membrane.
Divided into apex, body and root.
The muscles of the tongue have fibers
oriented in longitudinal, perpendicular and
transverse directions permitting the tongue a
wide range of movement. This is particularly
evident in cattle, which uses its tongue as
organ on prehension.
The surface of the tongue has large numbers
of projections papillae.

Common passage for the food and air.

The muscles of the walls of the pharynx
are responsible for orderly directing food,
air and liquid-Regulates Swallowing and
breathing.
Pharyngeal dysfunction causes serious
problems. It can result in food entering
the lungs causing aspiratory pneumonia.
At the entrance into trachea- epiglottis
that regulate the direction of food and air.

Muscular tube, extending from pharynx

to stomach/forestomach.
At the neck it is seen towards the left
side of trachea (this position is to be
noted for the surgical procedure
involving esophagus like choke removal)
Inside the thoracic cavity oesophagus is
found dorsal to the trachea and between
aorta and trachea.

The digestive organs of non-ruminants

and ruminants are very much similar
except in the stomach.
The non-ruminants are single-stomach
animals-monogastric animals. e.g. pig,
horse, poultry,men etc.
Located just behind the diaphragm on
the left side.
Somewhat bent and pear shaped.

Four regions namely 1.Oesophageal region.

2.Cardiac region-joining of esophagus to
stomach, near to heart.
At the junction of esophagus and stomach
are thickening of muscles- sphincter. This
sphincter is well developed in horses, so
they cannot vomit.

3.Fundic region.
4.Pyloric region- has a sphincter called
pylorus that control gastric emptying
into intestine.
Except esophageal region, rest of the
region has gland in their mucosa.
Cardiac region contains cardiac glands
that secrets mucus.

Fundic region contains fundic glands

(gastric gland proper) produces digestive
enzymes. Most dominant glands in
stomach.

Pyloric glands produces mucus.

The surface area of the stomach is

increased by in-folding of the epithelial
cells gastric folds.

Actually a single stomach modified by

marked expansion of the esophageal
region into three distinct and
voluminous diverticula-rumen,
reticulum and omasum.
These three are collectively known as
forestomach.
Forestomach are lined with nonglandular epithelium.

Comprises a series of chambers where

food is digested by microorganisms
before passing to the glandular portion.

The glandular portion (true stomach) is

abomasum which receives the digested
food from forestomach.

Rumen

large muscular sac that extends from

the diaphragm to the pelvis filling the left
side of the abdominal cavity.
Rumen is subdivided internally into
compartments by muscular pillars.
These pillars are visible as grooves on
the external surface of the rumen.
At the region of cardia there are two
heavy muscle folds. The two folds creates
a groove called esophageal groove.

The act of suckling initiates a reflex that

contracts the folds converting it into a
tube. This tube delivers the milk
directly to omasum and abomasum. So
the milk bypasses rumen and reticulum
and avoids souring of the ingested milk.

Recticulum
located immediately behind the diaphragm
just behind the heart.
Most cranial compartment.
It is located immediately caudal to the
diaphragm opposite to the heart.
It is also called the honey comb-Mucosa is
thrown into intersecting ridges that give the
appearance of honey comb

Omasum
Located to the right of the rumen and reticulum,
just caudal to the liver.
spherical organ filled with muscular liminae that lie
in sheet, giving the appearance of pages of a bookalso called as also called book-stomach
Pappilae are studded with short, blunt papillae that
help in grinding roughage before it enters
abomasum.
Also sorts foodstuffs- smaller particles are passed to
abomasum and the coarser ones are returned to
reticulum.

Abomasum (True stomach)

The true stomach in ruminants and it is
similar to the stomach of monogastric
animals. And its body extends caudad
on the right side of the rumen.
The glandular region are same as in the
simple stomach.
Pylorus controls the flow of materials
from stomach to intestine.

Starts from the pylorus of the stomach.

Described as
1. Small intestine
2. Large intestine.

Made up of three parts- duodenum,

jejunum and ileum. (based on the
histological differences)
Small intestine is the chief site for
absorption in all domestic animals.
On the mucous membrane it contains
finger like projection called villi (vilus)
that aid in absorption of digested food.

Duodenum
First part of intestine.
Attached to the body wall by
mesoduodenum.
Ducts from pancreas and liver opens into
duodenum emptying it digestive juices
from these glands i.e. bile from liver that
contains bile salt and bile pigment
Secretions from pancreas contain
digestive enzymes that aid is digestion.

Jejunum
Is the second segment of intestine and it continues
with ileum.
Longest portion of small intestine (upto 28 mts in
horses)
Numerous lymph nodes present in its mucosa and
submucosa.
Ileum
Is the last part of on intestine and it joins with large
intestine at ileo-ceco-colic junction.
Short and last part of small intestine.
Contains goblet cells- mucus producing cells.

Large intestine
Starts from ileo-caeco-colic junction
Consists of Caecum, Colon, rectum and
anal canal.
Colon divided into descending colon,
ascending colon and transverse colon
Water absorption takes place in this part of
intestine.
More variations from species to species
than in small intestine.

Modified form of digestive system.

Has beak without teeth in it instead of
mouth.
Oesophagus has a diverticulum called
crop-act as storage and soften the feed.
Pear shaped structure proventriculusalso soften the feed.Conected with
gizzard -involved in grinding the feed
(bird used small pebbles to aid in
grinding feed in gizzard grit

Gizzard is followed by small intestine,

which is divided, into duodenum,
jejunum and ileum.

Birds have a pair of caeca (caecum)

unlike animals.
Large intestine starts at ileo-caecal
junction and ends at cloaca-common
opening for both digestive system and
urinary system.

Digestion is first done by microbes in

the rumen - called microbial digestion.
Rumen maintains optimum pH and
temperature for the microbial growth plant substances are digested. This
leads to microbial growth producing
large quantity of microbial protein.

The feed along with microbes are pushed

into successive compartments of
forestomach and when food reaches
abomasums there is sudden drop in pH.
The acidic pH kills all microbes and the
protein digested and absorbed for use by
animal.
Where as the carbohydrate is directly
converted into volatile fatty acids that can
be absorbed into circulation for utilization.

No microbial digestion, so there is no fore

stomachs seen in ruminants.
While in animals like horse, rabbit microbial
digestion takes place in well-developed
functional caecum.
In first group of animals digestion is
enzymatic and starts from mouth with the
mixing of saliva.
There is secretion of enzymes at every stage
of digestion before absorption start in small
intestine.

Mouth
Site for the examination for lesion in
viral disease like foot-and-mouth
disease. Lesion normally seen in the
form of vesicle at lips, gum, dental pad
and tongue.

Oesophagus
At the base of the mouth oesophagus is
located dorsal to trachea and at middle
third of the neck oesophagus courses
on the left side of the trachea. This
location is important from the surgical
point of view in choke (oesophageal
obstruction) management in animals.

Rumen
Located on the left side of animal body,
at paralumber fossa. Any surgical
procedures associated with rumen like
Trocarisation, rumenotomy, has to be
performed on the left side of the animal
and not on the right side.
Even caesarian section is also done on
left.

Reticulum
Due to its close location with the heart
it may result in traumatic reticulopericarditis due to lodging of sharp
objects like nail that may be present in
commercial feed.

Abomasum
In pregnant animals abomasums may get displaced
either to left or right side or may result in torsion. In
any of these cases feed intake and production will
be hampered.
Intestine
This is one of the sites where internal parasites like
round worms get localized and cause harm to the
animal. Apart from this, organ like liver also will be
infested by parasite like live fluke

In addition to numerous small glands

located in the walls of the stomach and
intestine, accessory glands include the
Salivary glands, pancreas and the liver.

In domestic farm animals there are

three pairs of well defined glands and
scattered lobules of salivary tissues
(minor salivary glands).
The chief salivary glands are :
1. Parotid
2. Mandibular
3. Sublingual

The minor salivary glands are:

Labial
Buccal
Lingual
Palatine

Parotid salivary gland:

Located ventral to the ear
The duct opens into the mucus membrane of the cheek
near the 3-4 maxillary cheek tooth.
Mandibular salivary gland:
Located ventral to the parotid gland.
The duct opens ventral to the tongue at the base of the
mouth.
Sublingual salivary gland:
Located deep in the mucus membrane near the floor of
the mouth.
Duct opens into the floor of the mouth just ventro-lateral
to the tongue.

Secretions from salivary glands can be

serous, mucus or mixed.
Parotid s. gland- produces serous saliva.
Mandibular and sublingual-mixed (both
serous and mucus)
Minor salivary glands-mucus saliva.

An irregularly lobulated organ that lies

adjacent to the proximal duodenum.
Compound gland with both endocrine
and exocrine function.
Exocrine portion produces sodium
bicarbonate and digestive enzymes into
the duodenum.
The endocrine portion produces insulin
and glucogan.

Largest gland in the body.

Varies in numbers of lobes and precise
location from one species to another.
Located immediately caudal to the
diaphragm towards right.
All domestic animals except horses has a
gall bladder for stotrage of bile.
Secretion for liver, pancreas and gall
bladder open through a common opening
at the major doudenal papilla.