Important Factors in Chelonian Nutrition.

Chelonian nutrition is still a young, but very important field of study. This article provides practical feeding advice for tortoises and freshwater and terrestrial turtles. Areas covered include the different feeding ecology of different types of chelonians, their digestive physiology, growth rate, body condition scoring, an overview of what types of diets items can be used in captive diets, and examples of diets used for various species of chelonians.

Effect of varying dietary starch and fiber levels and inoculum source (mule deer vs. dairy cow) on simulated rumen fermentation characteristics.

This study measured starch and fiber digestion and microbial fermentation of three commercial exotic animal feeds using mule deer (MD) or dairy cow (DC) rumen inoculum. Diets were formulated to provide either high starch/low fiber (based on neutral detergent fiber fraction; NDF) with either alfalfa (diet A) or grain and oilseed byproducts (diet B) as the major fiber sources or low starch/high NDF (diet C). An initial batch culture incubation was run with diets inoculated with each rumen inoculum (n = 6; N = 36) over a 48 hr period with samples taken at different hour points for ammonia, pH, lactate, and volatile fatty acids (VFA).