Milk simply seeps out of the glands of the mother animal. But before you make your guesses, the milk teeth of the young don’t have any purpose nor has the mother nipples. The young are also fed in a way that no other animal does. As far as scientists can tell, the groups of animals that currently use them fit into two categories: animals with gizzards and animals that swim. That said, the absence of teeth and a stomach is not the only unique thing about the platypus. The fossil record tells us many herbivorous dinosaurs also ate rocks - paleontologists know when they find the telltale collection of small stones still trapped inside a fossilized ribcage. Gastroliths - the word literally means "stomach stones" - are most often used by birds and reptiles, but they can also be found in earthworms, some fish, amphibians, seals and toothed whales. These little stones even have a name - gastroliths - and their use as digestive tools have a long, illustrious evolutionary history. In other words, the platypus has no stomach. ![]() There's no sac in the middle that secrete powerful acids and digestive enzymes. However, some other animals actually need to swallow rocks in order to digest their food. And if you look inside a platypus, you'll find another weird feature: its gullet connects directly to its intestines. But it does have genes for an insulin system, which is critical in all mammals. ![]() With no stomach, the platypus, not surprisingly, doesn’t have genes for one. Do platypuses have stomachs In other words, the platypus has no stomach. Babies are constantly trying, and a condition called pica can compel an adult to eat nonfood objects like rocks and dirt. The platypus has no stomach, possibly because it doesn’t need one because it breaks up food so efficiently by grinding it between plate-like ‘teeth’ together with river gravel. Scientists can now synthesise the chemical so do not need to catch more platypuses Platypus venom could pave the way for new treatments for type 2 diabetes, say Australian researchers. Baby platypuses (or would you rather call them platypi) and echidnas are called puggles, although there’s a movement afoot to have baby platypuses called platypups.30. ![]() Gastroliths believed to have come from the stomachs of dinosaurs, found in the Jurassic strata near Starr Springs, Utah.Īs a human, you are not encouraged to eat rocks.
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