| Budget Amount *help |
¥4,940,000 (Direct Cost: ¥3,800,000、Indirect Cost: ¥1,140,000)
Fiscal Year 2011: ¥780,000 (Direct Cost: ¥600,000、Indirect Cost: ¥180,000)
Fiscal Year 2010: ¥910,000 (Direct Cost: ¥700,000、Indirect Cost: ¥210,000)
Fiscal Year 2009: ¥780,000 (Direct Cost: ¥600,000、Indirect Cost: ¥180,000)
Fiscal Year 2008: ¥2,470,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,900,000、Indirect Cost: ¥570,000)
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| Research Abstract |
Digestion process in the forestomach of a captive Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin(Tursiops aduncus) was observed using endoscope after feeding. Relationship between digestion stages of one prey item and elapsed time was investigated on several prey species. Required digestion time to empty forestomach was observed for some amounts of food. Elapsed time for vomit of undigested squid beaks was also estimated after feeding of an amount of squid beaks. These observations revealed that a prey item of 100g to 200g could be digested within 1.5 to 2 hours after feeding, an amount of food with which the animal is sated could be emptied from forestomach after 12 hours, and most of undigested squid beaks vomited within 24 hours. Furthermore, a part of prey of was digested in artificially conditioned digestive solution to observe difference of digestion speed among prey species. Pepsin extracted from dolphin stomach was tested for its active condition on pH and temperature. These observations and experiments clarified digestion speed in the forestomach of dolphin, and it is expected to be useful to estimate required energy and food amount per unit of time for wild dolphin with analysis of stomach contents.
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