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Evolutionary, molecular and comparative zoology
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RESEARCH ARTICLE
Contents Vol 58(2)

Consumption of milk by quokka (Setonix brachyurus) young

S. J. Miller A C , R. Bencini A and P. E. Hartmann B
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations

A School of Animal Biology, The University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Highway, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia.

B School of Biomedical, Biomolecular and Chemical Sciences, The University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Highway, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia.

C Corresponding author. Email: Sue.Miller@uwa.edu.au

Australian Journal of Zoology 58(2) 121-126 https://doi.org/10.1071/ZO09085
Submitted: 18 August 2009  Accepted: 31 May 2010   Published: 28 June 2010

Abstract

We investigated the consumption of milk by the young quokka using the stable isotope deuterium oxide. The volume of milk consumed increased from 1.6 mL day–1 at 55 days post partum to 32.5 mL day–1 at 165 days. The daily energy intake ranged from ~22 to 151 kJ day–1 during pouch life. The crude growth efficiency (grams of growth per millilitre of milk consumed) increased from an average of 0.35 to 0.46 g mL–1 in the early stages of pouch life, and then decreased to 0.24 g mL–1 during Phase 2b of lactation. The crude growth efficiency measured in our study indicates that quokkas are equally efficient in converting milk energy to body mass as other marsupials reported in the literature. Measuring milk intake with this method offers a non-toxic, minimally invasive alternative to other techniques for measuring milk consumption in marsupials, when milk is the only source of water intake.


Acknowledgements

The authors thank Mr Peter Cowl at The University of Western Australia and the late Dr Andy Coward, Mr Antony Wright and Ms Cheryl Kidney at the MRC Human Nutrition Research Elsie Widdowson Laboratory, Cambridge, UK, for their technical assistance and advice.


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