Models on diet quality (content in hemicellulose (Hem), lignin (Lig), cellulose (Cel), soluble fraction (SF) and nitrogen (N) per rumen) testing for the relationship between herbivores species and date.

Then, effect of species in the best model, is replaced by an alternative effect (body mass, diet category and breeder ability). The selected model (i.e. with the lowest AIC value) is in shaded cells.Table gives the degrees of freedoms (df) and the delta-AIC (ΔAIC) between the best model and the specified model (M1 to M8, BM1 to BM3) for each chemical component. The best model among the 8 first models denoted M1 to M8 has a delta-AIC of 0. The three last models, denoted BM1 to BM3, correspond to models replacing the herbivore species effect by herbivore species body mass categories (BM1) or categories based on digestive morphophysiology (BM2 and BM3). These models can be considered as better than the M1 to M8 model if their delta-AIC is negative.a: Number of degrees of freedom of the best model minus 2.b: Number of degrees of freedom of the best model minus 1.c: Number of degrees of freedom of the best model minus 2.