Pretty much as the question states: How is it that animals that consume mostly vegetation as opposed to meat so strong?
More specifically, how are animals like gorillas and horses so strong/decked out with so much muscle mass if they primarily eat grass/hay (in the case of horses) or leaves and bananas and bugs (in the case of gorillas? I understand that certain animals metabolize (break down and use) different foods differently, but it’s just mind blowing to me that these animals have such large muscles on such vegetable-heavy diets.
Moreover, they’re able to gain and maintain this muscle mass on these lean diets while also using those muscles almost ALL OF THE TIME. I mean, it would be difficult enough for a human to achieve such a muscle mass eating that same type of diet, but I would imagine that it would be EXTREMELY difficult for humans to achieve and maintain that level of muscle mass while simultaneously burning so many calories each day by using those muscles – I would imagine that a human with a similar diet with that amount of physical activity and that kind of diet would be fit and muscular, but have more of a “lean” or
“slim” muscular build instead of looking jacked like a horse or a gorilla.
So, what gives? How are they able to be so strong on such vegetable-heavy diets?
In: Biology
To add to the already well written comments, humans can get muscle mass from a non-meat diet too.
Our digestive system breaks food down to amino acids and sugars, which after transportation trough the bloodstream are re-assembled into muscles (and the rest of your body), depending on what your body thinks it needs. So if you train certain muscles a lot, they get made (a very very simplification)
But your body doesn’t care where those building blocks came from, provided it gets enough.
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