AS-HOPE report

Number: AS-23-024

Body size and the digestible ability in Japanese macaques

Report: Sawada Akiko

Date: 2011/5/9 - 2011/6/5

 Jarman-Bell principle has been invoked to the assumption of the higher digestive ability in larger animals. In Japanese macaques, however, we found no such positive relationship between body size and digestive ability. According to the works done by Dr. Marcus Clauss and his colleagues, this is the case not only in Japanese macaques, but in other mammalian species. Our data suggests that juvenile macaques have a shorter digesta retention time, which shows a different pattern compared with that of adults. An attractive hypothesis is a difference in gut peristalsis, which is possibly like to an ontogenetic changein the gut microflora, including the methanogens. This is quite a new idea for primatology, which allows us to write a paper with a deep, unique discussion.

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