Some time back Mark and I had an incredibly productive email dialog that went on for days. At the time I was studying dietary needs of redfoots in my ongoing quest to provide the absolute best of everything I can for my torts. Thanks to Tom McLellan we got our hands on DK Moskovits' "Diet and Food Preferences of the Tortoises Geochelone carbonaria and G. denticulata in Northwestern Brazil" I had been very excited to read this paper as I'd been able to find little information about the natural diet of redfoots.
Actually applying the information provided by the document proved difficult. Dietary ratios presented were not quantitative. She simply noted how often she observed a redfoot eating something. A nibble counts the same as eating the whole fruit, etc.. Also, nutritional information on the plant species presented were sometimes difficult to acquire (as these are not always food items in North America).
As I systematically worked through her data, learning whatever I could about the foods presented, one food stuck out like a sore thumb, and the more I learned about it, the more I became convinced it was the "key".
Buriti Fruit from the Mauritia Flexuosa Palm.
As it turns out, this is a very special tree.
It is called "The Tree of Life". The fruit it bears is incredibly nutritious, a veritable superfood. It has been studied extensively as a means to cure nutritional deficiencies in children and as a health and beauty aid to market to the "1st World". Its nutritional profile appears to be that of an ideal food source, covering all the needs in close to required ratios.
Even more fascinating is the fact that this tree is monotypical and pervasive throughout the amazon basin. The Amazon Jungle has an incredible diversity of life, more species per square mile than you can imagine. This makes it difficult to identify any kind of possible staple food sources for an inhabitant. Only one food source stands out and is available everywhere, the buriti fruit. In fact, the Mauritia Flexuosa can produce fruit nearly year round, so not only is it available everywhere, but anytime.
Mark naturally pointed out that not all redfoot live in the jungle.
As it turns out the Mauritia Flexuosa's range extends heavily into the surrounding "non-jungle" basin and savannahs, populating water channels and wet-lands.
So essentially, anywhere that redfoots live, there's a good chance you can find Buriti.
Some more interesting things about Buriti:
It is considered high in calcium, but as it is a fruit and not a plant part, I expect it will be low in oxalates.
It is very high in "essential oils". This is part of the marketing campain as a beauty aid. It occurs to me that those essential oils could be very beneficial to maintaining healthy scutes.
The big problem is....It doesn't seem to be available stateside (at least not as fresh fruit). I suspect it could be grown in parts of the southeast, but to the best of my knowledge this is not being done.
I then began to look for a "comparable" that was available. The closest I came were grape leaves. They really were a "close enough for horse shoes" match as far as nutritional profile goes. I simply have questions about the oxalate content of grape leaves.
In the end of all the dialogue I finally came away with the notion that diet wasn't really all that important and I dropped the matter. Interestingly, Mark seems to have come away with the opposite notion about diet. At least I'm fairly certain that we both get the others viewpoint, and agree that the other could be right. That's a matter for another day, however.
Actually applying the information provided by the document proved difficult. Dietary ratios presented were not quantitative. She simply noted how often she observed a redfoot eating something. A nibble counts the same as eating the whole fruit, etc.. Also, nutritional information on the plant species presented were sometimes difficult to acquire (as these are not always food items in North America).
As I systematically worked through her data, learning whatever I could about the foods presented, one food stuck out like a sore thumb, and the more I learned about it, the more I became convinced it was the "key".
Buriti Fruit from the Mauritia Flexuosa Palm.
As it turns out, this is a very special tree.
It is called "The Tree of Life". The fruit it bears is incredibly nutritious, a veritable superfood. It has been studied extensively as a means to cure nutritional deficiencies in children and as a health and beauty aid to market to the "1st World". Its nutritional profile appears to be that of an ideal food source, covering all the needs in close to required ratios.
Even more fascinating is the fact that this tree is monotypical and pervasive throughout the amazon basin. The Amazon Jungle has an incredible diversity of life, more species per square mile than you can imagine. This makes it difficult to identify any kind of possible staple food sources for an inhabitant. Only one food source stands out and is available everywhere, the buriti fruit. In fact, the Mauritia Flexuosa can produce fruit nearly year round, so not only is it available everywhere, but anytime.
Mark naturally pointed out that not all redfoot live in the jungle.
As it turns out the Mauritia Flexuosa's range extends heavily into the surrounding "non-jungle" basin and savannahs, populating water channels and wet-lands.
So essentially, anywhere that redfoots live, there's a good chance you can find Buriti.
Some more interesting things about Buriti:
It is considered high in calcium, but as it is a fruit and not a plant part, I expect it will be low in oxalates.
It is very high in "essential oils". This is part of the marketing campain as a beauty aid. It occurs to me that those essential oils could be very beneficial to maintaining healthy scutes.
The big problem is....It doesn't seem to be available stateside (at least not as fresh fruit). I suspect it could be grown in parts of the southeast, but to the best of my knowledge this is not being done.
I then began to look for a "comparable" that was available. The closest I came were grape leaves. They really were a "close enough for horse shoes" match as far as nutritional profile goes. I simply have questions about the oxalate content of grape leaves.
In the end of all the dialogue I finally came away with the notion that diet wasn't really all that important and I dropped the matter. Interestingly, Mark seems to have come away with the opposite notion about diet. At least I'm fairly certain that we both get the others viewpoint, and agree that the other could be right. That's a matter for another day, however.
