Soluble Fiber in prey items

[Nett]

Hey there,

I am trying to get as much input as I can on this .I am wondering if the soluble fiber we feed to our prey items can have an influence on the digestion process of the reptiles that eat them?
ie: ERS in ETBs

Any and all comments are appreciated [img]modules/Forum/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]
[addsig]

	Emerald Tree Boa The Emerald Tree Boa (Corallus caninus) is a species of bright green snake that lives in the rainforests of South America.

[bensnacks]

I've wondered about this one myself but (I'm only guessin')
I don't think it would make a huge difference .
[addsig]

	Geek Auto Linker or Gallon Geek Auto Linker Gallon - United States liquid unit equal to 4 quarts or 3.785 liters

[JuliusSqueezer]

Oddly enough, snakes get the fiber they need from fur and/or feathers. The ones that eat worms, small fish, frogs etc. don't need any apparently. Probably because these food items are fairly easy to metabolize anyway. Feeding feeder rodents a healthy diet with no animal protein has been proven to benifit the animals that feed on them whereas snakes that are fed on rodents who feed on poor diets such as dogfood with high contents of animal protein and/or red food dye are likely to develop kidney problems. At least that's what I think I read somewhere awhile back. Common sense should tell you though that healthy feeders are healthier to eat. What a healthy diet for a rodent consists of is all very high fiber anyway so yes...I would say they benifit just because the rodent grows up healthier. Not because he still has fiber in his guts from his last meal though.
[addsig]

	Geek Auto Linker or Gallon Geek Auto Linker Gallon - United States liquid unit equal to 4 quarts or 3.785 liters

[Nett]

Hey,

The problem I have seen with rodent diets is that alot of them consists of more insoluble fibers than soluble ones.Its has now been found in dog and cat foods anyway that the more replacement of insolubles with solubles help aid lowering the pH of the colon,production of short chain fatty acids,inhibits gastric and small intestine mixing,alters the rate of nutrient absorption,and helps regrow the good bacteria in the gut.So if reptiles such as ETBs digest there food in sort of the same manner, as everything other animal us included,could not the addition of more soluble fiber in the pray items diet be used as a preventive to ERS.Does anyone know of any studies on the subject?

Any and all comments are appreciated. [img]modules/Forum/images/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif[/img]
[addsig]

	Emerald Tree Boa The Emerald Tree Boa (Corallus caninus) is a species of bright green snake that lives in the rainforests of South America.

[eddie]

I have heard that feeding the food a piece of orange can somewhat give the snak some vitamin C but I haven't seen any studies that verify this...
[addsig]

	Geek Auto Linker or Gallon Geek Auto Linker Gallon - United States liquid unit equal to 4 quarts or 3.785 liters