3 modules describing on a very elementary level how to read a feed test, how to understand what animals need in their diet for nutrients, and how to balance a simple cattle ration using hay and silage.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"The tick-borne parasite Theileria annulata can cause life-threatening illness in cows. Buparvaquone is the only available drug treatment, but the incidence of buparvaquone (BPQ) resistance is increasing so alternative therapies are needed. To help, researchers recently tested the efficacy of the anti-malaria drug artemisinin and its derivatives against T. annulata infection. Artemisinin itself wasn’t effective, but all of its derivatives were able to selectively kill parasite-infected cells. Artesunate (ARS) and dihydroartemisinin (DHART) were especially potent and either drug could act synergistically with BPQ, enhancing the parasite-killing effects of the individual compounds. Investigation of the mechanism revealed that ARS and DHART caused oxidative stress and DNA damage in the infected cells which activated the protein p53 and the caspase-dependent cell death pathway..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

Due to their size and anatomy, cattle are not very good candidates for general anaesthesia meaning that many procedures performed use local techniques. Most surgeries performed on these patients can be done standing with a small amount of sedation and regional and local nerve blocks. Local techniques are also used in cattle for procedures such as castration and dehorning. General anaesthesia is rarely carried out in these species.

This video from Nature offers a description of desirable traits in beef and dairy cattle.

In this video segment from Nature, learn about six different breeds of cattle.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Antibiotic resistance is increasingly prevalent, with costs to the economy and to human health. Globally, antibiotic usage in livestock is expected to increase by 66% by 2030, and antibiotics used in animals are clinically relevant to humans. Better understanding the effects of different antibiotics and manure management practices will help to decrease the potential for antibiotic resistance. In a recent study, researchers examined the effects of different manure composting techniques in dairy and beef cattle treated with different antibiotic regimens. They found that the total antibiotic resistance gene (ARG) expression, or “resistome,” changed with the progression of composting with time. The relative abundance of ARGs decreased over time in all conditions, except when the compost was externally heated, but in contrast to the overall trend, some ARGs, including Sul1, intI1, beta lactam, and plasmid-associated genes, increased in all finished composts..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Ruminants’ ability to break down human-inedible plant fibers stems from the microbes in their rumen. This process is primarily driven by microbes that can ferment plant fibers into volatile fatty acids (VFAs), followed by the rumen epithelial layer absorbing and partially metabolizing these VFAs. Recently, researchers examined how microbes and epithelial cells interact and contribute to VFA metabolism in lactating dairy cows. Metagenomic binning allowed researchers to categorize and examine the metabolic capacity of even uncultivated microbes and identify bacterial genomes with both cellulose/xylan/pectin degradation capabilities and associations with VFA biosynthesis. They then used gene expression data to construct a single-cell map of the rumen epithelial cell subtypes. Searching gene expression profiles for VFA transporters highlighted key epithelial cell subtypes. Leveraging this data highlighted interactions where microbes potentially influenced the gene expression of host epithelial cells..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

Learn how a cow eats and digests food in this video segment from Nature.

These materials have been put together to help students and youth to learn the basics of judging and evaluating dairy cattle using various methods. This resource was designed to be used with other resources to help teach basic dairy cattle judging and evaluation. There are numerous 4-H, Cooperative Extension and Breed Association booklets freely available, referred to in the document. However, this resource differs as it is intentionally full of visual examples and videos. The objective is to provide educators with additional resources to help beginning cattle judges understand visual evaluation and comparative judging techniques, as well as breed standards, linear scoring, oral reasons and the basics of fitting and showmanship.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Postpartum systemic oxidative stress is common in dairy cows and can lead to health complications and production loss. While the gut microbiota can influence host health and stress, its role in dairy cow postpartum oxidative stress was unclear until a recent study found a strong link between the fecal microbiota and postpartum oxidative stress in dairy cows. Compared to low oxidative stress (LOS) cows, those with high oxidative stress (HOS) had altered bacterial community composition, including 16 species from 9 genera that were negatively correlated with oxidative stress. There were also changes in the microbiota’s functional behavior and related metabolites, and the findings suggested that changes in glutathione synthesis played a causative role in oxidative stress. Specifically, HOS cows had reduced microbial metabolism of amino acids involved in glutathione synthesis..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Mastitis is a severe disease in cows that decreases milk yield and quality in dairy farms around the world. Although pathogenic infection of the mammary gland is a major cause, the gut microbiota is also thought to play a critical role. Studies have shown that mastitis is associated with gastrointestinal imbalance caused by the acid build-up associated with a high-grain diet, but the direct link between gut microbes and mastitis remains unclear. To address this gap, researchers investigated the microbes and their metabolites in the gut of cows fed a high-grain diet. Findings revealed elevated levels of sialic acid. Separate experiments in mice showed that supplementation with sialic acid aided the proliferation of Enterobacteriacea. These microbes damage the gut barrier, allowing toxins to enter the intestine and cause local inflammation, which then progresses to systemic inflammation when the toxins enter the blood..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

Diners sitting down to enjoy a burger couldn't be faulted for wondering, "Where's the beef from?" After all, just a few months ago, European consumers were dismayed to discover that many products marketed as beef actually contained large quantities of horse meat. Genetic fingerprinting, which was used to detect the imposter beef, can identify meat as a particular species or even a particular population. However, other analyses of genetic data can trace the source of a patty, McNugget, or filet, not just to a particular breed or population, but back in time. Using these techniques, scientists have uncovered the deep evolutionary origins of domesticated animals (such as sheep) and major crop plants (such as corn). Now, they've applied those techniques to cattle as well. This month, a team of researchers from the Universities of Texas and Missouri announced the results of a study focusing on the origins of breeds specific to the Americas, like the Texas Longhorn. The story told by the cows' genes crisscrosses the trajectory of human evolutionary history from wild aurochs that lived alongside Neanderthals, to Christopher Columbus and, ultimately, the American West

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Lignocellulose is a major component of the woody portion of plants. The polymers it houses, like xylan and cellulose, could be used as biofuels or in other plant-based materials. The breakdown of lignocellulose requires specialized carbohydrate-active enzymes (CAZymes), but targeted discovery of novel CAZymes is difficult due, in part, to their structural diversity. In a recent paper, researchers have proposed a new method to speed up this process. They combined phenotype-based selective pressure with functional profiling to screen unknown enzymes. Feeding cattle a forage-based diet applies selective pressure on their rumen microbiota for microbes with specialized fiber-degrading enzymes. Three glycoside hydrolase families had increased abundance in feed-efficient cattle compared to their inefficient counterparts on this diet. Screening some members of those families against a database of uncharacterized enzymes led to the identification of putative xylanases and endoglucanases..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.

Bring your students to a sale barn auction inside your classroom! Whether the sale barn is in your town or an hour away, this lesson can help students think like a cattle feeder - using math to determine how to bid and when they should bid on cattle that are at the sale barn.

El estudio se realizó en 18 distritos de la provincia de Huancavelica, encuestando a 426 productores de bovino durante 2020. Los productores, con un nivel educativo primario o sin educación en su mayoría, se dedican principalmente a la agricultura y la ganadería, y no suelen recibir sueldo por su trabajo. La raza principal de ganado es la Brown Swiss (37.6%), y los productores mantienen un promedio de 6.5 cabezas de vacuno, con un sistema de producción semi extensivo. El objetivo principal de la crianza de bovinos es la producción de leche (46.9%) y doble propósito (44.1%), aunque la mayoría de los productores no puede determinar el peso vivo del bovino que vende. Aunque se practica el pastoreo y la suplementación con sal común, no se conservan pastos para la temporada seca, y la mayoría de los productores tiene dificultades para detectar el celo y determinar la edad al primer servicio. Predomina la monta natural, sin mejoramiento genético, y no se realiza un manejo adecuado de enfermedades como la mastitis y la fasciola. Los productores carecen de equipos y maquinarias, no reciben asistencia técnica adecuada y no siguen un calendario sanitario. Se concluye que la administración y la asistencia técnica en áreas como la reproducción, la sanidad, el mejoramiento genético y la alimentación son deficientes.

Poster announcing annual cattle feeders meeting, showing head of a cow. Date stamped on verso: Mar 25 1941.

Poster for presentation of "A Texas Steer" at the Mason Theatre, showing a long-horn steer wearing a cowboy hat.

This resource is a video abstract of a research paper created by Research Square on behalf of its authors. It provides a synopsis that's easy to understand, and can be used to introduce the topics it covers to students, researchers, and the general public. The video's transcript is also provided in full, with a portion provided below for preview:

"Livestock waste is a common fertilizer for crop fields. Many farms remove the solids from manure and store only the remaining liquid, called slurry, for later use, but little is known about the microbial contents of slurries, especially the viruses. To close this gap, researchers sequenced the slurry virome of a cattle farm over a 5-month period. They used a hybrid approach, combining short and long sequencing reads, which provided more comprehensive results than using only one method. The farm's virome was dominated by lytic bacteriophages and 98% were from novel genera. The overall diversity and composition was stable over time. In fact, over half of the operational taxonomic units were detected in all the samples. Functional analysis found a range of metabolic genes, diversity-generating retroelements, putative antibiotic resistance genes, and virulence factors. These results mean that spreading slurry may allow phages to spread those virulence and antibiotic resistance genes to bacterial pathogens..."

The rest of the transcript, along with a link to the research itself, is available on the resource itself.