Re: Mollusk eating (was Re: Sauropod necks????)

["Jaime A. Headden" <qilongia@yahoo.com>]

David Marjanovic (david.marjanovic@gmx.at)> wrote:

<I wonder... wouldn't this mean the animal eats the shell rather than the 
contents? :-}>

  Aside from the semantics ... no. Egg eating snakes actually do consume the
shell, but later regurgitate it. But in all actuality, physical adaptations for
eating hard-cased foods (durophagy) are for rending the case permeable, rather
than in processing in contents of the shell. Thus little "consumption" (phagein
= phagy) occurs of the shell. This is true of egg-eaters, crab-eaters,
clam-eaters, smaller animals which consume insects, nut eaters, etc. Thus the
terminology is allusive, not explicit.

  Cheers,

Jaime A. Headden

  Little steps are often the hardest to take.  We are too used to making leaps 
in the face of adversity, that a simple skip is so hard to do.  We should all 
learn to walk soft, walk small, see the world around us rather than zoom by it.

"Innocent, unbiased observation is a myth." --- P.B. Medawar (1969)


                
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