Frugivorous animals are those that base their diet on the consumption of fruits , or much of what they consume is made up of this type of food.In the animal kingdom, many species are frugivorous, from insects to large mammals.
The plants that produce fruits are the angiosperms .In this group, the flowers of the female plants or the female parts of a hermaphrodite plant have an ovary with several ovules that, when fertilized by a sperm, thickens and changes color, acquiring very attractive nutritional qualities for animals.
20% of the known species of Mammals are frugivorous animals, so this type of diet is very significant and important among animals.
At first glance, frugivorous animals do not seem to possess distinctive features of animals not frugivoros, even less if they are omnivorous animals that, although they can be feed on many products, its main food is fruit.
The main qualities appear along the digestive tract , starting with the mouth or beak.In mammals or other animals with teeth , these are usually wider and flattened in the teeth to be able to chew.Animals with non-chewing teeth usually have a row of small and equal teeth that serve to chop the fruit and swallow smaller pieces.
Frugivorous birds usually have a curved or concave beak in order to extract the pulp from the fruits; This is the case of parrots.Other birds have a finer beak and rest, which serves to feed on smaller fruits that can swallow full.
Arthropods have a specialized jaws to crush the food.A species can feed on fruit during certain stages of its life and have another diet when they are adults or even may not need to eat.
Another very important characteristic of these animals is that n or digest the seeds , however, produce in them a physical and chemical modification, called scarification, without which they could not germinate once outside.
Fruiting plants and frugivorous animals have coevolved throughout history.The fact that the fruits of the plants are so striking and nutritious it is not for the seeds to feed on the , but to get the attention of the animals.
Frugivorous animals will eat the pulp of the fruit ingesting the seeds.With this, the plant achieves two benefits :
When passing through the digestive tract, the acids and movements of the had a protective layer removed from the seeds ( scarification ) causing germination to occur much faster, thus increasing the chances of survival.It makes the food through the digestive tract of the animal usually lasts for hours, even days, so if an animal ate a certain fruit in a certain place, when it is going to excrete it, it is most likely that it is very far from the tree that produced it, thus dispersing the offspring of that plant , causing it to colonize new places.We can say, then, that the fruits are the reward that animals receive for disseminating the seeds, as well as pollen for a bee is the reward for pollinating the dis red plants.
Frugivorous animals are spread all over the planet, in all regions where there are plants with fruits.Next, we present some examples of frugivorous animals that demonstrate this diversity.
1.Frugivoros mammals
Relations between plants and animals tend to be strong, especially for those species that feed exclusively from fruits as is the case of the flying fox ( Acerodon jubatus ).This animal lives in the forests where it feeds, and is in danger of extinction due to deforestation.In Africa, the largest species of bat is also a frugivora, the hammerhead bats ( Hypsinathus monstrosus ).
On the other hand, most primates are frugivorous.So, even if they carry an omnivore feed, its The main food is fruits, for example, chimpance ( Pan troglodytes ) or gorilla ( Gorilla gorilla ), although many lemurs are also frugivoros.
The new world monkeys, like the howler monkeys , arana monkeys and titis , play an important role dispersing the seeds of the fruits they eat, so they are also part of the list of examples of frugivorous animals.
The musaranas , the lirones and the opossums are fruit-eating nocturnal mammals, although if they intersect with a worm they will not last to eat it.
Finally, all ungulates are herbivorous, but some, like the tapir , feed almost exclusively on fruit.
3.Frugivoras birds
Within birds, the psitacidas stand out as the big consumers ace of fruits, with a beak completely designed for it.Also important are fruit species of the genus Sylvia or warblers .Other birds, such as the cassowary ( Cassuarius casuarius ), they also feed on a wide variety of fruits found in the forest floor, being indispensable for the dispersal of plants.The toucans base their diet in fruits such as berries, although they can also eat small reptiles or mammals.That is, in captivity it is important for you to take a certain amount of animal protein for your health.
4.Frugivorous reptiles
There are also frugivorous reptiles, such as the green iguanas .These do not chew the food, but with their small teeth cut pieces that can swallow complete.Other lizards such as the pogonas or cleaved can eat fruit, but they are omnivorous, unlike green iguanas that are herbivores , so they also need insects and even micromamifers.
The land turtles are the other group of frugivorous reptiles, although they sometimes eat insects, molluscs or worms.
5.Invertebrates frugivoros
On the other hand, there are the invertebrates frugivoros, as is the case of the fruit fly or Drosophila melanogaster , widely used in research.This minuscule fly lays its eggs in the fruit, which will hatch and the larvae will feed on the fruit until they metamorphosis and go to adulthood.Also, many bedbugs , hemipter insects, absorb the juice from inside the fruits.
6.Frugivorous fish
Although it may seem strange, we close the list of examples of frugivorous animals with this group, now that there are also frugivorous fish such as those belonging to the serrasalmidos family .These fish, commonly called pacu , are They plant from plants, but not only from their fruits, but also from other parts such as leaves or stem.
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