INVESTIGATIONS AMONG FRUITARIANS IN 
CALIFORNIA, 1901-2. 
INTRODUCTION. 
An investigation of the nutritive value of fruits, instituted by the 
Office of Experiment Stations, was undertaken at the University of 
California in 1900-1901, and dietaries of five fruitarians— two women 
and three children — were studied. At the same time with one of the 
children — a girl — a digestion experiment was made in which fruit and 
nuts constituted the entire diet. A study of the income and outgo of 
nitrogen and the estimation of the so-called metabolic nitrogen in the 
feces were included in the digestion experiment. The results, which 
were given in an earlier publication, showed in every case that though 
the diet had a low protein and energy value, the subjects were appar- 
ently in excellent health and had been so during the five to eight years 
they had been living in this manner. 
In continuing the investigations on the nutritive value of fruits and 
nuts it was deemed advisable to extend the work to include, in addi- 
tion to the women and children previously studied, subjects whose 
lives and habits differed considerably from those of the earlier inves- 
tigation. Accordingly four men were selected, two being past the 
middle age and two young men university students. The elderly men 
had been more or less strict vegetarians and fruitarians for years. 
One of the young men had been experimenting with the fruitarian 
diet for several years, while the other was accustomed to the ordinary 
mixed diet. 
The purposes of the inquiry were in brief: (1) To make dietaiy 
studies and digestion experiments in which the diet should consist 
exclusively or largely of fruit and nuts; (2) to obtain information 
regarding the practicability of maintaining- nitrogen equilibrium in 
the body with an exclusive fruit and nut diet, and (3) to collect data 
on the digestibility of fruit and nuts. 
In studying these problems 9 dietaiy studies have been made in 
which, with 2 exceptions, the food consisted chiefly of fruit and nuts, 
and 31 digestion experiments with the four subjects just referred to, 
in 13 of which fruit and nuts constituted the main and in IT the entire 
diet. 
The income and outgo of nitrogen was determined in each of the 
digestion experiments, and the so-called metabolic nitrogen in the 
feces was also studied. 
" r. s. Dept. Agr., Office <»t' Experiment Stations Bui. 107. 
