History Main / VegetarianCarnivore

In RealLife, vegetation isn't exactly the best source of food. It's hard to digest, is low in some essential nutrients, and requires a specialized digestive system in order to properly process it into anything useful for the animal eating said vegetation. Because of this, most carnivorous animals are not well-adapted to eating plant materials (unlike herbivores, naturally).

* Any human who switches to a fully vegan diet, since humans are omnivores by nature. Although humans can adapt to almost any diet, vegetarian is much less radical, and vegetarians can generally find their protein in the foods vegans scorn.

* Baloo from Disney's version of ''Disney/TheJungleBook'' really seems to enjoy dining on fruits and the occasional insect rather than on meat. Justified, in that RealLife bears are actually omnivorous, and plants do make up a large part of their diet.
** The polar bear lives as a carnivore due to a lack of plants in the Arctic, while the panda bear acts like a herbivore despite its digestive system being more suited to eating meat, for the simple reason that plants are incapable of running away when you attack them. Regardless, both are technically omnivores.

** Most bears anyway. The polar bear is a carnivore due to a lack of plants in the Arctic, while the panda bear is a herbivore despite its digestive system being more suited to eating meat, for the simple reason that plants are incapable of running away when you attack them. However, Baloo is clearly neither of these.

* The Giant Panda is a classic RealLife example. It's an omnivore, and has a digestive system better suited for eating meat. However, it's main diet consists of bamboo. This is because bamboo is plentiful and easy for the slow-moving panda to obtain as a food source rather than expending all of its energy chasing after prey. Their very inefficient digestion of bamboo makes them even more unsuited for hunting afterwards. So despite their reputation giant pandas ''will'' eat meat if given the opportunity. A video shows a panda eating a cow.

** In fact, it's especially bad with cats (felids) and ferrets since they, along with otters, polar bears, tarsiers, grasshopper mice, aardvarks, and Tasmanian devils are by far the most strict meat-eaters of all terrestrial and semi-aquatic mammals (pinnipeds, sea otters, and toothed whales are even more carnivorous). Not to mention that many cats can't eat gluten (wheat protein) and it can in fact ''kill'' them. While cats do chew on plants occasionally, they do as a stomach remedy and vitamin supplement, not as a source of calories.

* Any human who switches to a vegetarian or vegan diet, since humans are omnivores by nature. However, this is a lesser example than most of the others, as although no hunter-gatherer society subsisted on a diet of less than 15 percent animal products, humans can adapt to almost any diet.

* Any human who switches to a vegetarian or vegan diet, since humans are omnivores by nature. However, this is a lesser example than most of the others, as humans can adapt to almost any diet.

* Inverted in the Disney film ''TheWild''. A herd of wildebeasts are tired of always being hunted by predators, so [[AscendedToCarnivorism they decide to switch their diet to meat and become predators themselves.]]

** Which is also a case of SomewhereAMammalogistIsCrying since dolphins are just as vicious fish-hunters as sharks, if not even more so. Some dolphins even eat sharks.

* In a famous Korean myth, a tiger and a bear wanted to be human and, in order to do so, they had to eat nothing but garlic and herbs for 40 days. The tiger could not and gave up, while the bear perservered, became a woman, married a semi divine being, and gave birth to the founder of the first organized Korean state. Note that bear is actually an omnivore that can digest vegetable matter while tiger is an obligate carnivore that cannot.

* {{Godzilla}} Junior from the Heisei (1984-1995) era of Godzilla films is shown to dine on leaves despite the fact that it was established that Godzilla's species is carnivorous.
** [[{{Film/Godzilla}} Zilla]] is something of an inversion. Marine iguanas are strictly vegetarians dining on seaweed, but Zilla's diet consists mainly of fish.
* The titular character from ''TheodoreRex'' is a Tyrannosaurus and a "recovering carnivore". His diet mainly consists of vegetables and [[TrademarkFavoriteFood cookies.]]
* ''SevenPounds'' has Emily, the female LoveInterest, claim her great dane is a vegetarian, eating only tofu and steamed broccoli. Obviously, the dog disagrees, devouring meat when offered it by Ben.

* Subverted in ''Literature/{{Twilight}}''. The vampires in question claim to be "vegetarians", but they really just feed on animal blood instead of human blood.

* [[http://www.amazon.com/Children-Steel-John-Van-Stry/dp/147008502X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1354115014&sr=8-1&keywords=Children+of+steel "Children of Steel"]] had Terease, an anthropomorphic leopard raised by vegetarian humans. She took vitamin supplements at home but couldn't find them on the Astra, by the time Raj practically forced her to eat meat she was severely emaciated.

* Tiger from ''AnAmericanTail'' is a vegetarian cat who is appalled at the very thought of eating mice. He does occasionally eat [[NoCartoonFish fish]] now and then, though.

* [[http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2008/10/alligators_eat_fruit.php Some individual alligators are known to eat fruit.]] No one is quite sure why, and the alligators do still mostly eat meat when given the chance, but scientists think it may be an adaptation for when food supplies are low (and might help explain how crocs have survived as long as they have).

* [[http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2008/10/alligators_eat_fruit.php Some individual alligators are known to eat fruit.]]

* The Giant Panda is a classic RealLife example. It's an omnivore, and has a digestive system better suited for eating meat. However, it's main diet consists of bamboo. This is because bamboo is plentiful and easy for the slow-moving panda to obtain as a food source rather than expending all of its energy chasing after prey. Their very inefficient digestion of bamboo makes them even more unsuited for hunting afterwards. It should be noted, though, that giant pandas ''will'' eat meat if given the opportunity.
** A recent video shows a panda eating a cow.

** Subverted with Ruby and Strut, which are both plant eating theropods, but since their species were omnivorous in RL it's not particularly odd.
*** Omnivores still need the nutrients that come from meat, and real-life theropods would have starved on the diet Ruby and Strut were eating.
** What about Elsie the Elasmosaurus? [[SomewhereAPaleontologistIsCrying She's basically portrayed as a 'swimming long neck']] and has the dental equipment to match. Despite the fact that Elasmosauruses had needle-like teeth and ate mostly fish and squids. Despite the fact that a somewhat more realistic one was shown in the direct predecessor to the film she was in.
*** Though note that she's not actually shown eating anything...

* The unfortunately named Kinkajou ([[HehHehYouSaidX hee hee, kinky Jew]]), is a monkey/cat like animal of the rainforest whose diet consists mainly of fruit despite being classified in the order "carnivora" and has sharp teeth.
* The binturong, or bear cat, is an omnivorous animal sometimes compared to a bear (although they are more related to mongooses), whose diets consist mostly of fruit, but will eat eggs and small animals if given the opportunity.

* In TheBible, Isaiah prophesied that when the Messiah comes to reign, "the lion shall eat straw like the ox," and animals will live together in peace.

** Zilla is something of an inversion. Marine iguanas are strictly vegetarians dining on seaweed, but Zilla's diet consists mainly of fish.

** In fact, it's especially bad with cats (felids) and ferrets since they, along with otters, polar bears, tarsiers, aardvarks, and Tasmanian devils are by far the most strict meat-eaters of all terrestrial and semi-aquatic mammals (pinnipeds, sea otters, and toothed whales are even more carnivorous). Not to mention that many cats can't eat gluten (wheat protein) and it can in fact ''kill'' them. While cats do chew on plants occasionally, they do as a stomach remedy and vitamin supplement, not as a source of calories.

** In fact, it's especially bad with cats (felids) and ferrets since they, along with otters, polar bears, tarsiers, aardvarks, and Tasmanian devils are by far the most strict meat-eaters of all terrestrial and semi-aquatic mammals (pinnipeds, sea otters, and toothed whales are even more carnivorous). Not to mention that cats can't eat gluten (wheat protein) and it can in fact ''kill'' them. While cats do chew on plants occasionally, they do as a stomach remedy and vitamin supplement, not as a source of calories.

** In fact, it's especially bad with cats since felines, along with ferrets, otters, polar bears, tarsiers, aardvarks, and Tasmanian devils are by far the most strict meat-eaters of all terrestrial and semi-aquatic mammals (pinnipeds, sea otters, and toothed whales are even more carnivorous). Not to mention that cats can't eat gluten (wheat protein) and it can in fact ''kill'' them. While cats do chew on plants occasionally, they do as a stomach remedy and vitamin supplement, not as a source of calories.

* Any human who switches to a vegetarian or vegan diet, since humans are omnivores by nature. However, this is a much lesser example than most of the others, as humans can adapt to almost any diet.