I don't think so, many times the stalk is implied to remain the same when it's eaten, and either the ko's are able to eat it normally, or it's so hard that their mother have to "soften it up" before letting them eat it. In either case it would be troublesome for the yu's with the thorns there.
But maybe it's one of those sacrifical evolution? as in they sacrifice the nutritional potential of the stalk for a defensive capacity, same way they sacrifice the defensive capacity for extra nutrition?
JusticeItEasy said: I don't think so, many times the stalk is implied to remain the same when it's eaten, and either the ko's are able to eat it normally, or it's so hard that their mother have to "soften it up" before letting them eat it. In either case it would be troublesome for the yu's with the thorns there.
More likely the latter. A lot of authors have used the "parents chew up their stalk for their babies' first meal" bit before, even if those were because the infant koyukkuri were too young to handle hard food, and none like this situation, where the stalk may be dangerous for them to handle.
Indeed but wouldn't the torns be also a problem for the parents? That could easily become a test of parenthood considering the low tolerance to pain yu's have in general and the idea of bearing lot of pain just to give their lil ones their first meal ever.
starshine said: Or in this case, the flower and leaves are the bitchingly tasty nutritious part and the stalk is discarded or used as part of nest defenses. Perhaps.
Now that's a interesting idea you got there! Maybe the more babies the more flowers and leaves it sprouts, like 1 flower each 2 babies, and 1 leave each baby.
Looking at it longer, the leaves look kinda bland. Maybe they are edible but also serve the purpose of instant blankets?
And maybe the stalk's rigid enough so that after birth, a parent just has to snap off the end with the flower and paste just drips/gushes out for a bit, whatever's left from pre-birth.