Sweet Potato?

ColleenT

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FWIW, ZooMed's 'gourmet' diet evaluates out as one of the best foods for tortoises, based on the natural diet of Cal desert tortoises. It is grassland with hibiscus and sweet potato.

Box turtles rarely like tortoise diets. They have a different dietary palate. For Box turtle feeding, read the link in my signature.
 

Yvonne G

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My box turtles eat the Zoo Med gourmet - moistened and mixed in with veggies, greens and fruit.
 

ColleenT

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My box turtles eat the Zoo Med gourmet - moistened and mixed in with veggies, greens and fruit.

Oh, really? you must have started them young. all of mine have been extremely picky. they will eat greens and fruits, but they hate packaged diets and tortoise food is the last on their list. Many people i have spoken to have said the same thing.
 

Yvonne G

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I start them out eating the same things I feed my baby leopards and desert tortoise, but with fruit and animal protein added.
 

mark1

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i'm guessing the point was that sweet potato is nutritious and worthwhile to feed ? I would add some foods are more nutritious cooked , I think sweet potato and carrots might be a couple of them ……..
 

Kapidolo Farms

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i guess i don't get your point.

without regard to the animal, box turtle, tortoise, prehensile tailed skink, porcupine, etc. RAW in a size the animal can consume is preferable. When you cook it it changes the molecular makeup of the diet item, break down cells' walls etc.

It does not all come out in this kind of search . https://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/ . but it is different.
 

mark1

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I think when it comes to micronutrients , it's not always how much is in it , it is the bioavailability ………. feed a dog carrots , carrots in , carrots out , cook them a little and they can actually get something out of them ………. I believe breaking down the cell walls might have something to do with it ? it may very well not apply to animals evolved to extract nutrients from plants , but people are evolved to be omnivorous and it works for us ……...

Bioavailability of Micronutrients from Plant Foods: An Update
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25748063
However, prudent cooking practices and use of ideal combinations of food components can significantly improve micronutrient bioavailability. Household processing such as heat treatment, sprouting, fermentation and malting have been evidenced to enhance the bioavailability of iron and β-carotene from plant foods




Bioaccessibility of carotenes from carrots: Effect of cooking and addition of oil

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S146685640700046

Carotenes transferred to the digests were micellarised to a higher extent from cooked carrots (52%) than from crude carrots (29%). ....................The higher amounts of micellarised carotenes (80%) were found in the digest prepared from cooked carrots containing 10% olive oil.
 

Kapidolo Farms

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I think when it comes to micronutrients , it's not always how much is in it , it is the bioavailability ………. feed a dog carrots , carrots in , carrots out , cook them a little and they can actually get something out of them ………. I believe breaking down the cell walls might have something to do with it ? it may very well not apply to animals evolved to extract nutrients from plants , but people are evolved to be omnivorous and it works for us ……...

Bioavailability of Micronutrients from Plant Foods: An Update
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25748063
However, prudent cooking practices and use of ideal combinations of food components can significantly improve micronutrient bioavailability. Household processing such as heat treatment, sprouting, fermentation and malting have been evidenced to enhance the bioavailability of iron and β-carotene from plant foods




Bioaccessibility of carotenes from carrots: Effect of cooking and addition of oil

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S146685640700046

Carotenes transferred to the digests were micellarised to a higher extent from cooked carrots (52%) than from crude carrots (29%). ....................The higher amounts of micellarised carotenes (80%) were found in the digest prepared from cooked carrots containing 10% olive oil.
does this info come in a sweet potato version? Carnivores do not have a food fermentation process in their gut as do herbivores. The gut biome is different. Point to the extreme, there are microorganisms that eat rock, but in a dog or tortoise it's rock in - rock out.
 

mark1

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absolutely , many , it's a pretty well recognized fact across the board ………. fermentation takes place in all animals digestive tracts , feed my dogs milkbone bisquits and you'd have no doubt……… dogs have survived on largely plant based diets since the advent of commercial dog food ……..

Evaluating Sweet Potato as an Intervention Food to Prevent Vitamin A Deficiency

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1541-4337.2010.00146.x

Bioaccessibility varied with processing method so that raw < baked < steamed/boiled < deep fried (Bengtsson and others 2009; Tumuhimbise and others 2009).
 

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