Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I remember growing up the cows loved sassafras leaves and I have made tea from the roots. I gave a few to my Sulcata, Hermanns, and 2 Russians and they loved them, then I thought, "Any danger?"
BTW-if you ever ate in New Orleans, guess what the filet in filet gumbo is (ground sassafras leaves).

A google search shows many dangers of ingesting Sassafras. Seems it is toxic to the liver among other things. Sure does taste good though. As a child I chewed the leaves, twigs, made tea, etc. Didn't know any better.

OK and thanks for the help. No more sassafras for the torts (or me).

You might want to rethink totally giving it up. As with many plants, in excess it could possibly do harm to humans/mammals.

Keep in mind that the reptile physiology is very different than mammals and many things the herps consume are known to be toxic to mammals. What toxic foods herps consume might even be beneficial to them.

I noticed that Sassafras was used to relieve kidney stones which is sometimes a big problem in tortoises.

If you went down the list and omitted every food that is listed in one reference or another I'll bet you would end up feeding your guy air... wait... I'll bet I can find a reference that says that is bad also.

(i'm sure you get the idea)
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Ed
Tortoise_Keepers-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
Trying to keep the fun in Chelonian care

EJ said:
"Keep in mind that the reptile physiology is very different than mammals and many things the herps consume are known to be toxic to mammals. What toxic foods herps consume might even be beneficial to them. "

I would disagree a little with this. If research indicates that a food will cause harm if consumed to excess, and the food is absolutely and totally non-essential to the well-being of the animal, then I wouldn't feed it.

There's a strange leap of logic in your statement above. You seem to be saying that since we don't really know the answer (about sassafras), it may just be good for them. Since it seems we know the answer for at least some animals, then there's no good reason to take a risk, especially when the value of the food is low. It would be better, in my opinion, to reduce the risk of kidney stones by using your recommendations on hydration, not by using a food of questionable value.

I guess My logic is strange in that I don't know what my tortoises need for good health and development. This is why I like posts similar to the original post. The person made an observation and I noticed that no mention of a bad reaction on the animals part. I now have one more food item I can to provide as varied a diet as possible.

I don't think there is any one food item that is essential to the well being of the animal. There are elements that are essential and those elements are found in various foods in various forms. I'm under the impression that by limiting those forms we are doing more harm than good.

It seems that many of the decisions on what to feed or not to feed is based on what we think the animal needs. That is why the 'varied diet' idea is such a good one. Because we don't really know what is needed we are bound to hit what is needed if we give as varied a diet as possible.

It comes back to making it available to the animal as part of a highly varied diet then let the animal decide.

As I pointed out, if you omitted every food that had the potential of doing harm, what would you feed.

Key word... excess but even then there are exceptions.

I find it interesting that the tortoises seem to like it as the observation was posted.
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Ed
Tortoise_Keepers-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
Trying to keep the fun in Chelonian care

"I guess My logic is strange in that I don't know what my tortoises need for good health and development."

Well, you do know to some degree by reading field research. You know they don't eat hot dogs (I'm being silly). Wait, we do know that some of them will eat hot dogs (or newspaper, or candy, etc.) , so going by what they *will* eat versus what they *should* eat isn't an approach that I would fully endorse.

I agree with your varied diet approach. Right now there are a limited number of weeds and clover in my yard, so I have to supplement with endive and greens from the Brassica group. I know Brassica's have potential problems, so I throw in what weeds I can find, and make sure the torts are warm and hydrated and supplemented.

Now if I throw in a couple pieces of Sassafras do I think their little livers will explode? No. Can I think of a good reason to recommend using it at all? No. If a reptile's physiology is different enough that it can eat some foods that are poisonous to us, it could also be different enough that a mildly toxic food (to mammals) could be moderately toxic to them.

Since I don't know the answer, I won't use the food. It crosses my line of caution. Brassica's, when "part of a varied diet", have worked well for lots of tort keepers. Maybe in a few years we'll be saying sassafrass is a good part of a varied diet. But without anything to back it up, other than the torts seem to like it, I won't be using it.

PS - just so no one misunderstands, this all boils down to where I draw the line. I definitely don't think any less of anyone who uses sassafras. Or even hot dogs. Well, maybe hot dogs.