Genetics, more muscle fibers per unit area than humans, lots of T, and constant foraging.
Leaves and stems are 10-20% protein by dry weight
Per calorie, Broccoli has as much protein as steak.
No kidding? Is this true of other brassicacea?
Broccoli stands out a bit. Cabbage and cauliflower and kohlrabi and bok choy don’t have the same protein ratio, because other brassicas we eat as vegetables are generally higher in carbs, so that their protein per calorie is lower (with more calories from carbs rather than protein).
You just wanted to say, “brassicacea.”
Your just jealous you didn’t know that word well enough to use it yourself
broccoli doesn’t look as calorie dense as steak though.
Awww shit guess it’s time for Bananamaxxing!
I’ve been beanmaxxing
Banana Island time 🍌
They have a long hind gut with specialized bacteria to break down cellulose, so they get way more protien from plants than humans. Horses use a similar trick.
Other comments are about how gorillas have guts adapted for digesting lots of vegetation. And that’s true. But at its core, it’s just that gorillas actually do eat a ton of protein.
They eat like 30 kg of food per day for 5000 calories, about 25% of which is from protein. That’s more than 300 grams of protein per day.
Nothing they eat is super calorie dense, but the lack of density also means they need to eat all day. And as it turns out, the leaves they eat tend to be pretty high in protein.
Weird that every time you see a gorilla though, he’s just sitting there looking like a jacked freaking gorilla, not doing a dang thing.
Yeah like not working out or anything. I can sit around eating all day too, but my muscles just wither away.
Their muscles do not wither away, they stay they do not have that mechanism. They wound simply die when there is a food shortage while humans adapt.
People have a muscle mass regulating hormone that prevents us from developing huge muscles easily.
Also gorillas don’t eat bananas in the wild, true banana species all come from Asia. The closest they could get is Ensete ventricosum.
Apparently looks like this.
Wonder what it tastes like.
Banana…peel.
I meen there’s the inside, around those big seeds :)
Cows and Kangaroos are pretty jacked too. Wouldn’t want their palates or diets though.
Cows and kangaroos get their protein from gut bacteria, bit of a cheat code
Pure herbivores’ main advantage over us is their ability (through their gut bacteria) to make use of all the carbohydrates in cellulose.
For protein, cattle and other herbivores do have a higher ability to extract usable amino acids from plant sources within the actual structural matrix of how they exist naturally in the plant, but we humans deal with that by processing and cooking our food instead of eating raw plants. Herbivores also have to do a lot more mechanical processing, especially chewing, to break down the structure of the plant matter for their guts to process.
The fact is, herbivores have to eat so much more food than meat eating animals do. Gorillas eat 30 kg of food per day. Elephants eat 75-150 kg of food per day.
And in captivity, fruit-eating primates need protein supplements, to make up for the fact that human-bred fruit tends to be much higher in sugar and lower in protein (per calorie, at least) than what these animals eat in the wild, especially when you account for insect parts that are common in wild fruit.
They have huge guts. We have tiny guts.
Built different.
Also, their testosterone levels are through the roof
Genetics.
Bamboo bro
