Difference between ruminant and non ruminant

Ruminant are animals that ruminate, that is; animals that chew the cud while non - ruminants do not ruminate. There are four processes of rumination as follows

• Regurgitation:vomiting the content of the stomach to the mouth
• Re-mastication : Biting and grinding food in your mouth so it becomes soft enough to swallow
• Re-salivation : Secretion and mixing of saliva with the food
• Re-swallow : Taking back the food to the stomach 

This processes distinguishes a ruminant animal from a non-ruminant    

Secondly, the ruminant also called polygastric have complex nature of stomach, while the non-ruminant or monogastric have simple nature of stomach.

A ruminant has four compartment stomach which is the rumen, reticulum, omasum, and the abomasum ( true stomach ). The presence of a rumen makes an animal a ruminant because of the beneficial bacteria breaks down the fiber in the food liberating proteins, fatty acid and vitamin B before the food goes to the reticulum. The reticulum prevents big pieces of food from going deeper into the stomach, then returns the big pieces to the rumen for Regurgitation, Re-mastication, Re-salivation and Re-swallowing. Finally, the chewed food passes to the reticulum, to the omasum and to the abomasum before moving to the small intestine.

 All ruminant are herbivore but not all non-ruminant are herbivore. Examples of ruminants are goat, sheep and cattle while of non-ruminant are pigs, any specie of birds, elephant, rat, humans, lions.

Horses, rabbits are not ruminants they are considered pseudo-ruminants because they have simple nature of stomach.