Effects of aging on the food intake in the feeding behavior of Aplysia kurodai.

In wild Aplysia, the birthdate of animals can typically not be determined. Therefore, we sought a reliable index of old age by taking into consideration the distinguished Japanese seasons. Large amounts of eggs and dead bodies were present on the coast during and after the second half of May (MayS). Body mass decreased after May. We roughly classified animals collected before and after the MayS as mature and old animals. Plots of internalized shell length (S) against body mass (B) gave distinct best-fit curves for mature and old animals. The B/S significantly decreased in the second half of June, suggesting that body mass decreases with age but shell length is maintained in each animal. Therefore, the collected animals were classified into mature and old animals using the best-fit curves for animals classified by the collection period. We examined the amount of food intake every 2 h up to 8 h after providing food. The amounts increased linearly, and the rate was significantly lower in old animals than in mature animals. The amount of 1-day food intake was also significantly lower in old animals. These results suggest that food intake may decline with age and this may cause mass loss in old animals.