CasqueAbove
Chameleon Enthusiast
There has always been the question of why females are far more likely to eat your plants. So it has been something I have been contemplating, and trying to observe any difference in male to female behavior in this regard.
One of my firs observations, that I still find odd. Was when my male was injured and lost his tongue. I always thought he would naturally start eating more plants. Makes sense, they are much easier to catch. This did not happen, and where in his younger days he ate some plants, now it is never.
The second was just today. I observed my female eating her ficus, but she had climbed way out to get the most tender, and likely extra nutritious, as the new growing process at this stage creates a lot of carbohydrates and amino acids, baby leaves.
So we have a male that ate plants when he was younger/smaller and at an older larger age does not.
Then we have a female that, dare I say harvests, she will wait every couple of weeks, then go eat all the new shoots.
If we look at a tree, or even large bush in nature, where are the new shoots ? out on the ends of the branches of course.
So if over the course of thousands of years, the smaller females that could better reach this extra source of food, particularly in times of drought or harsh season, would survive longer, and have more babies that survive longer using this technique. This would result in a population where the females eat plants. But what of the males, why would they not develop the same survival trick? We we do see some of this, but nearly as much in males. Why not ? Well as a male there would be two primary reasons why.
1) Size at twice the size of a female, it is safe to assume that they would not be able to reach the thinner branches that the females could, making their options less nutritious.
2) There is simply no need. As a large male you claim territory, and seek mates. You are not producing the eggs, so your nutritional need would in fact be less than the females. Time is simply spent doing boy things.
@kinyonga @PetNcs
anybody, Thoughts on this theory .
One of my firs observations, that I still find odd. Was when my male was injured and lost his tongue. I always thought he would naturally start eating more plants. Makes sense, they are much easier to catch. This did not happen, and where in his younger days he ate some plants, now it is never.
The second was just today. I observed my female eating her ficus, but she had climbed way out to get the most tender, and likely extra nutritious, as the new growing process at this stage creates a lot of carbohydrates and amino acids, baby leaves.
So we have a male that ate plants when he was younger/smaller and at an older larger age does not.
Then we have a female that, dare I say harvests, she will wait every couple of weeks, then go eat all the new shoots.
If we look at a tree, or even large bush in nature, where are the new shoots ? out on the ends of the branches of course.
So if over the course of thousands of years, the smaller females that could better reach this extra source of food, particularly in times of drought or harsh season, would survive longer, and have more babies that survive longer using this technique. This would result in a population where the females eat plants. But what of the males, why would they not develop the same survival trick? We we do see some of this, but nearly as much in males. Why not ? Well as a male there would be two primary reasons why.
1) Size at twice the size of a female, it is safe to assume that they would not be able to reach the thinner branches that the females could, making their options less nutritious.
2) There is simply no need. As a large male you claim territory, and seek mates. You are not producing the eggs, so your nutritional need would in fact be less than the females. Time is simply spent doing boy things.
@kinyonga @PetNcs
anybody, Thoughts on this theory .