"Uncle Davey"
> "Seppo Pietikainen"
> > Uncle Davey wrote:
> > > "Bob Casanova"
> > >> "Uncle Davey"
> > >>>So primates come from rodents, now.
> > >>>Good luck, digesting wood.
> > >>
> > >>If you go further back we also come from fish. Does that
> > >>mean we should be able to breathe underwater? (And FWIW, the
> > >>ancestors of primates probably derived from insectivores,
> > >>not rodents, admittedly a *very* minor point.)
> > >>
> > >>AND BTW, just which rodents were you thinking of; you know,
> > >>the ones which eat wood?
> > >>
> > > Obviously I was thinking of beavers. There's hardly an hour goes by, and
> > > all that...
> >
> > You believe that beavers eat wood?
>
> They dam well do.
^^^
Nice pun Davey. But It depends on how you define wood. They actually
eat the bark, that's where the live tissue is that transports the
sugars and water. They do not eat dead wood. Most of a tree is
deadwood.
However, Beavers do have bacteria in their gut that can digest
cellulose, so some of the cell wall material in plant cells can be
digested. I'm not sure whether the bacteria could digest enough of
the cellulose from a diet of dead wood alone for a beavers to be well
fed.
I have heard that beavers will re-eat their scat since the bacteria
have already partially broken down the cellulose, so second time
through it is more nourishing. This is analagous to the cows second
stomach, but beavers don't have second stomachs so they have to re-eat
scat. May be this is their winter strategy when food is scarce?
David
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