Bush tucker...

[khiemtran]

We were flicking through a book by Les Hiddens on Bush Tucker the other day. It was a pretty good reminder of just how hard most of the fauna and flora in this country is actively trying to kill you. And how amazing the original inhabitants were for finding ways to survive.

For example: there are several types of berry and other plants that will kill you if you eat them. Some of them will make you sick if you have a cut on your hand when you crush them. But if you crush them without a cut on your hand and then put them in water ... then up will float stupified fish, which you can then cook and eat.

Just don't, you know, drink the water...

Comments

[carl-allery.livejournal.com]

That's pretty cool. Though one wonders exactly how it was discovered. Presumably someone mistakenly crushed the berries was told to wash their hands/berries thrown in a stream/pond and up floated the fish. But then, knowing what the berries do, would you risk eating them? More likely perhaps to be a 3rd party who finds the fish and the connection is discovered later.

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

one wonders exactly how it was discovered

Yes, that's the question that always bothers me. 'This made me very ill when I ate it, and it made me ill when I boiled it, so maybe if I soak it for two days and then boil it?

[carl-allery.livejournal.com]

I just can't see self-experimentation. I think it's more along the lines of someone who can't get better quality food/doesn't know any better/is new to the area and is forced to eat what they can find, like the veggies that haven't been eaten by the grazing animals because they've fallen into a pond and been sitting in water for a few days, or a stash collected by a squirrel that's got damp and started fermenting. The chance to try the fresh version comes later or someone else says don't eat those they'll make you sick, when you've already been eating them for some time, so you make sure to always ferment or soak + boil.

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

There are other plants that need to be soaked for days to make them non-toxic, so some of the discovered methods are quite elaborate. On the other hand, some fruits (for example paddy melons) are just listed as "poisonous" and you have to wonder how many people got sick trying to find a way to eat them.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

It's also strange when part of the plant is edible and part is deadly, like rhubarb. Who'd have thought that even though you can eat the delicious stalks, you can't eat the leaves?

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Rhubarb is the sort of vegetable that gets a C+ for effort, even though it's still partially trying to kill you.

[lethargic-man.livejournal.com]

Well that goes for all foodstuff which take preparation. How was it discovered that you've got to soak beans for a day then boil them for an hour before they're safe to eat? Probably discovered by people desperate for food, and the learning process would have involved a lot of food poisoning.

And then you've got things like cheese. "Ugh, something horrible has happened to the milk. Let's try eating it!" (Well, actually, more like: "How can we get the milk to last through the winter when the cows aren't lactating?" But it was still probably a discovery process that involved lots of food poisoning.)

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Desperate, or possibly unobservant...

"You're not eating THAT are you?"
"Why... what is it?"

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Yes, I can see the leap from "these are poisonous" to "we can use them to kill fish". I just wouldn't have thought of eating the fish. I guess when you're into desperation stakes there's always someone hungry enough (plus, of course, there's accidental discovery). Once the idea of using poisonous plants to stun fish gets out, it's probably a smaller leap to trying different poisonous plants...

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure Australia is a fantasy invention that so many people believed in, it became real. I mean platypuses? Really?

What's the berry, by the way? And when you say it'll make you sick if it gets into a cut, what kind of sick.

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

I don't remember the name of the berry, but there were a few different plants used for that purpose. The berry was one of those bright red ones that pretty much scream "Poison!"...

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure Australia is a fantasy invention that so many people believed in, it became real.

LOVE!

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

The French in me read Les Hiddens as Les Hiddens (The Hiddens, so something along the lines of "the things which are hidden" ), an odd mix of French and English to be sure. :P

Nature and the ingenuity of all species are amazing, amazing things.

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Correction: it's actually Les Hiddins. He's famous here as The Bush Tucker Man.