IDK, I'm just not willing to quickly jump to the whole KASU/plot device assumption. It's there, probably on accident, but that doesn't mean that we can't work to make it make sense.
I am
but an english degree and recent rereads have made me cynical.
I like the breathing thing. I also agree that they'd need to eat basically constantly to maintain their metabolism. Andalites are an active species, and are able to digest and convert the energy in our food into energy for their bodies, so they must use a similar mechanism and get a similar amount of energy from the food they eat. That logic doesn't feel rock-solid, but anyway, I know they talked about "morning grass" and "I went out to feed that evening" or whatever but the only way for their whole energy-absorption system to make sense, at least to me, is if they're eating all. the. time. I mean, they come from a planet that's basically one huge meadow. They're grazers, not hunters, so they have no need to adapt to stalls in metabolism or any periods of starvation at all. Unless there are Andalite droughts or seasons or something, I mean, the Ellimist did mention harvesting leaves in his prehistoric escapades...
okay I'm going off the deep end and I better stop before I drown completely