Fruit and fibre: the nutritional value of figs for a small tropical ruminant, the blue duiker (Cephalophus monticola)

Abstract

Tropical forests throughout the world are home to a guild of small ruminants that consume fruit as a substantial portion of their diet. Because the rumen is relatively inefficient at digesting nonstructural carbohydrates and only slowly digests cellulose, the feeding adaptations of frugivorous ruminants are enigmatic. We examined the nutritional value of wild figs to blue duikers, one of the smallest and most frugivorous ruminants, through chemical analyses and a series of digestion trials with six species of wild African figs. These figs were high in fat, protein, cell wall, lignin and Ca : P ratios, low in sugar and starch, and high in unextractable, fibre‐bound tannins when compared with many other fruits. The fibre‐bound tannins and protein caused protein digestibility and nitrogen balance to be consistently low or negative. The high fibre content of the figs allowed duikers to only digest 30–60% of energy contained in the figs. However, duikers were able to consume enough digestible energy to maintain body mass during 4‐day trials. Therefore, a ruminant digestive system is beneficial to mammals eating high fibre, high‐tannin tropical fruit like figs, especially if the mammal is small enough to harvest a sufficient amount to meet its daily energy requirements and has adaptations for reducing the effects of tannins on protein digestibility.

All-You-Can-Eat: Influence of Proximity to Maize Gardens on the Wild Diet and the Forest Activities of the Sebitoli Chimpanzee Community in Kibale National Park

“… N: number of samples; X: mean energy gain in kcal/g of dry matter (DM); SD: standard deviation. Values for the different sites are from: 1 this study, 2 [ 84 ], 3 [ 85 ], 4 [ 86 ], 5 [ 87 ], 6 [ 88 ], and 7 [ 31 ]. SBL: Sebitoli; KNP: Kibale National Park (no site specified); KWRA: Kanyawara; NGO: Ngogo, all sites are located in Uganda; RF: ripe fruit; URF: unripe fruit; * missing values in our study (we took RF and URF values instead).…”

Diet and Seed Dispersal by Eulemur coronatus (Gray, Primates and Lemuridae) in the Amber Mountain National Park, Madagascar

“…Crowned lemurs spent more than 33% of their feeding time eaten Moraceae plant family. Species of Moraceae family are rich in tannins (Kendrick et al, 2009). Food items rich in tannins can minimize the possibility of iron absorption (Krishnamani & Mahaney, 2000).…”

Preparation of an Acid Butanol Standard from Fresh Apples

“…We recommend that proanthocyanidin concentrations be reported as mass % equivalents of procyanidin dimer. In a recent study of Ficus tannins, we reported a range of 0.15 to 6.40% dry matter of proanthocyanidin, using the acid butanol assay standardized with our Sorghum procyanidin standard (Kendrick et al 2009). If we had used the apple dimer, we would have reported values from 0.21 to 8.96% dry matter procyanidin dimer equivalents.…”