Cattle are ruminants which mean they have a stomach with several chambers which helps digest their food more efficiently. A cow's stomach has four chambers called the "reticulum", "rumen", "omasum" and "abomasum". The reticulum is known as the "hardware" stomach because it is mainly used as a storage area for hard things that the cow might accidentally swallow like nails, rocks and other objects. The rumen is the largest chamber in a ruminant's stomach, and in cattle it can hold up to 50 gallons feed. It is the chamber where fermentation takes place to help break down the grass that the cow has eaten. The omasum, also known as "many piles" is a compartment that squeezes or absorbs all the water that has accumulated from the digestion that has gone on in the rumen. The fourth chamber is the abomasum which similar in function to a human's stomach, and so is called the "true stomach." 