Nutritional evaluation in cotton-top tamarins (Saguinus oedipus).

Four cotton-top tamarins were fed a commercial biscuit diet and three others a commercial canned diet for 12 weeks. Thereafter, all seven were fed a purified diet for 12 weeks. General health, body weight, food intake, fecal output, serum biochemistry, blood count, and colonic histopathology were evaluated at various times during the experiments. The diets did not affect these parameters except the purified diet was associated with relatively reduced fecal output. Diarrhea and chronic colitis occurred independently of the diet in three tamarins in the course of the study.