Lions have nutritional requirements that can’t be met without meat or enough generations and pressures to evolve the ability to process what they need from plants.
That is a major difference between big cats and dogs, as dogs are omnivores and could make due without meat.
I think it’s mainly a semantic dispute, but I don’t think I would classify dogs as omnivores. They are more like scavenging carnivores, who will fortify their diet with some vegetation. I believe dogs are slightly better than wolves at absorbing some nutritional value out of starchy vegetables, but I don’t think they would “make do” without meat for very long.
Lions have nutritional requirements that can’t be met without meat or enough generations and pressures to evolve the ability to process what they need from plants.
That is a major difference between big cats and dogs, as dogs are omnivores and could make due without meat.
I think it’s mainly a semantic dispute, but I don’t think I would classify dogs as omnivores. They are more like scavenging carnivores, who will fortify their diet with some vegetation. I believe dogs are slightly better than wolves at absorbing some nutritional value out of starchy vegetables, but I don’t think they would “make do” without meat for very long.