bovine gut metagenome

Tall fescue feeds up to 20% of the beef cattle at the step prior to finishing on feedlot. The cultivar KY-31 is popular to the farmers for a low pasture management cost but toxic to cattle, causing Tall Fescue toxicosis; while MaxQ is non-toxic but requires special pasture management and less attractive economically. In search of alternative ways of alleviating the toxicity, our study analyzed the rumen microbiome composition of Hereford Angus cross steers with two sensitivity levels to fescue toxicosis that grazed on MaxQ with an intervening KY-31 grazing period, and employed 16S rRNA-V4 element as identifier. Our study aim to determine whether the toxic and non-toxic cultivars establish unique types of rumen microbiomes and if the cattle's relative sensitivities to Tall Fescue Toxicocis influence microbiome characteristics.