Red grouse caecal metagenomics

Red grouse (Lagopus scotica) eat a high fibre, predominantly plant-based diet. As such, it would be expected that their caecal microbiota would have contain bacteria that were efficient fermenters of fibrous compounds. In this study, DNA was extracted from the caecal contents of birds from three gaming estates in Scotland (n=15 samples, 5 per estate). Illumina metagenomic sequencing was performed, and metagenome assembled genomes constructed.