"صحة الأعيان" تزور شركة دار الدواء للتنمية والاستثمار معنويات مرتفعة في معسكر المنتخب الوطني في مسقط توقيع مذكرة تفاهم بين القوات المسلحة وهيئة النزاهة انخفاض معدل البطالة بالمملكة في الربع الأول وثيقة نادرة لإعلان وفاة الشريف الحسين بن علي "الريادة النيابية" تزور وحدة مكافحة الجرائم الإلكترونية الملك يتقبل أوراق اعتماد عدد من السفراء انطلاقُ أعمال منتدى بلاد الشام والعراق في الجامعة الأردنيّة: سوريا الجديدة محور النقاش مندوبا عن الملك.. ولي العهد يرعى حفل تخريج دورة مرشحي الطيران شرعية القوة أم قوة الشرعية؟ هيئة تنشيط السياحة تنظّم ورشة عمل متنقلة في العراق لتعزيز التعاون السياحي الكلية الجامعية الوطنية للتكنولوجيا توقع مذكرة تفاهم وتعاون مع جمعية آفاق لدعم الطالب المحتاج والمتعثر التدخين لا يزال الشيء إلا بضده مندوبا عن الملك وولي العهد...العيسوي يعزي آل خزنة كاتبي "الأوقاف" تحدد موعد صلاة العيد وأماكن المصليات الشريدة يؤدي اليمين القانونية أمام الملك سفيرا لدى اليابان البيت العربي يناقش العنف الأسري وكيفية معالجته من خلال الادب الفناطسة يشارك ضمن وفد رسمي برئاسة وزير العمل في مؤتمر العمل الدولي وزير المياه والري : المشروع أولى مشاريع البنية التحتية لمشروع الناقل الوطني جامعة عمان الاهلية تستقبل نشامى الأردن بمسقط

How do koalas drink? Scientists find it's not the way we think

How do koalas drink Scientists find its not the way we think
الأنباط -

People have long been puzzled about how koalas get enough water and it turns out they lick tree trunks after it rains.

 

Scientists have solved a lingering mystery about koala behaviour - how the tree-dwelling marsupials native to Australia drink enough water to live.

A new study describes koala drinking behaviour in the wild for the first time, finding that they lick water running down the smooth surface of tree trunks during rainfall - a phenomenon called "stemflow" - and do not rely merely on the water content of the leaves that make up their diet.


The findings, which the researchers said may be useful in koala conservation efforts, were based on 46 observations ofkoalasin the wild from 2006 to 2019, mostly at You Yangs Regional Park in Australia's southern state of Victoria.

"I think the main message is that behavioural observations in the wild are very important to establish what is normal and what is unusual, and to truly understand what animals need. If we watch them carefully, they will tell us," said University of Sydney ethologist Valentina Mella, lead author of the research which was published this week in the journal Ethology.

Diet of leaves

Koalasspend most of their lives high up in eucalyptus trees. They rely on a diet of eucalyptus leaves, normally consuming about 1.1 to 1.8 pounds (500 to 800 grams) daily.

The word koala is thought to have meant "no drink" in one of Australia's Aboriginal languages and the question of their water consumption had long been puzzling.


 

"Koalashave been alleged to never drink free water in the wild, or to drink only occasionally. Drinking behaviour has often been considered unusual and attributed to disease or to severe heat stress," Mella said.

"Koalaswere thought to gain the majority of the water that they require from the moisture content in the leaves that they feed on and to drink water unintentionally in the wild by eating wet leaves after rain, or when dew is present on the leaf surface," Mella added.

They sleep about 20 hours a day to conserve energy because their diet requires a lot of energy to digest.

"Koalasare nocturnal animals, so they are only active at night, and they are arboreal, which means that they live in trees and rely on them for food, shelter and, as we just discovered, also for drinking," Mella said.

"Koalasactually spend 98 percent of their lives in trees and the only time they are on the ground is when they are trying to find another tree with a more generous food supply or a mate."


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