The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1890-05-24
HOW THEY FEED.
Teeth End No Teeth; Teeth in the
Throat and in the Stomach.

Teeth Enc NO I00C0S A00CA Al VIC
Throat and in the Stomach.
Eating is such a common thing
with us, happening, as it does, some
thing like 1895 times year, that
the process is looked upon as even
less interesting than that of wash
ing. To be sure, there are gour-
mands who look upon eating as the
one great object of life, and unless
we eat we cannot live; but the eat
ing referred to here is the mechan-
ical and not the astronomical pro-
cess. To eat, with Us, involves
taking the food either with the
hands or some appliance fitted for
hands, such as the knife and fork,
using the front teeth or incisors to
bite off the piece desired, and then
masticating or grinding the food
with the back or molar teeth. The
masticated food is then dropped by
way of the esophagus or gullet into
the stomach, and there acted upon
by the various fluids of the body un-
til digestion has been accomplished.
The process is by no means the
same in every animal, however, as
the subjoined notes will show.
That peculiar echinoid, the sea
urchin has five teeth in five jaws
one in each jaw-all the five imme-
diately surrounding the stomach.
The jaws have a peculiarly central
lied motion, all turning inward and
downward, so that they also act as
feeders.
Snails have teeth on their tongues,
hundreds of them, but, as if these
were not enough, some have them
also in their stomach.
The cutie fish, which among 9TH
er strange things always walks with
its head downward, does not chew
it's food at all, but masticates with
its gizzard. So do geese, fowls,
ducks, and indeed all modern birds.
Selling their food in their beaks,
they swallow it whole, if grain or
seed, and in large pieces if it be
fruit or bread. In that condition
it goes into the gizzard, a powerful
muscle with a very tough, horny
lining, which acts as a mill, being
sufficiently powerful to pulyerize
uncooked corn. To assist in the
milling process, all grain-eating
birds swallow little pieces of gravel,
glass, crockery, metal, etc, the In
terror of the gizzard being sutfi-
ciently tough to escape cutting by
these materials. 1t is because OF
this fact that the ostrich has &C
quired his reputation of enjoying a
ferruginous diet.
The carp's teeth are set back on
the pharnyx, SO that it may be lit
orally said to masticate it's food in
| it's throat. The carp is about the
only cud-chewing fish, the coarsely
swallowed food being forced up to
these throat teeth for complete
mastication.
Some fishes are absolutely tooth
less, like the sucker and lamprey
others again have hundreds and
hundreds of teeth, sometimes sc
many that they cover all parts OF
the mouth.
! The great Greenland whale has
no teeth, its baleen plates, or whale
bone, taking their place. Along the
center of the palate runs a strong
ridge, and on each side of this there
is a wide depression along which
the plates are inserted. These are
long and fat, hanging free, and are
! placed transversely-that is across
The mouth-with their sides parable
and near each other. The base anc
outer edge of the plates are of sollc
whalebone, but the inner edges are
fringed, filling up the interior o.
the mouth and acting as straine1
| for the food, which consists of the
small swimming mullusks and me
dusa, or jelly fishes. This whale
rarely, if ever, swallows anything
larger than herring, shoals of these
small creatures being entangled II
the fibeTs of the baleen, the water
which does not escape from the
mouth being expelled by the blow
holes. Though the cavity of this
whales mouth is big enough to con
tain a ships long boat, the gullet il
no larger than mans fist. The
lower jaw has neither baleen nol
teeth, but has large, hesby lips
within which the upper is received
when the mouth is closed. While
the Greenland whale has no teetf
the sperm whale has them in grea
quantities on the lower jaw, ane
uses them, too, when occasion re
quires.
Man is the only animal that ha'
teeth-incisors, CANNES and moiar'
of an equal height. Man, the ape
and nearly all ruminants, have
thirty-two teeth. The hog, however
is better off than this, and has forty
four. So have the opossum ane
mole. The river dolphin of Soutl