. The Ecology of arboreal folivores : a symposium held at the Conservation and Research Center, National Zoological Park, Smithsonian Institution, May 29-31, 1975 . Figure 6. Changes in body weight of a young captive three-toed sloth fed on an alternating diet of powdered, rehydrated leaf of Cecropia eximia and Lacmellea panamensis. Lacmellea leaf was about times as digestible as Cecropia leaf. The sloth died at the end of the experiment. and the amount eaten. The difference between food input and feces outflow was greater when Lacmellea was fed, averaging gm per day for Lacmellea leaf
. The Ecology of arboreal folivores : a symposium held at the Conservation and Research Center, National Zoological Park, Smithsonian Institution, May 29-31, 1975 . Figure 6. Changes in body weight of a young captive three-toed sloth fed on an alternating diet of powdered, rehydrated leaf of Cecropia eximia and Lacmellea panamensis. Lacmellea leaf was about times as digestible as Cecropia leaf. The sloth died at the end of the experiment. and the amount eaten. The difference between food input and feces outflow was greater when Lacmellea was fed, averaging gm per day for Lacmellea leaf, and for Cecropia; because of the small number of measures the difference was not significant. However, the difference may indicate that Lacmellea leaf was digested more completely than Cecropia leaf. We began the experiment by feeding powdered old Cecropia leaf for the first 4 days (Figure 6). During this time, the sloth's weight decreased steadily, and it lost a total of about 100 gm (8 percent of its initial weight). We then changed the diet and maintained the sloth for the next 7 days on rehydrated Lacmellea leaf. The sloth steadily gained weight for a total of about 200 gm (approximately a 17-percent increase). We then again fed rehydrated Cecropia leaf, and continued to do so until the sloth died 7 days later. The animal lost almost 20 percent of its body weight, and at the end of the experiment weighed approxi- mately 150 gm less than at the beginning of the experiment 20 days earlier. During the time the sloth was fed Cecropia eximia, it was unable to gain sufficient energy to maintain its body weight, probably because the leaf material could only be digested slowly. Lacmellea panamensis, a more digestable leaf (Table 15), was probably di- gested at a higher rate, and the animal was able to extract enough energy to grow. While the sloth was fed Cecropia during the 7 days before it died, it could not extract sufficient energy from the food to main- tain body weight.
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookcolle, booksubjectleaves, booksubjectmammals
