- cross-posted to:
- hackernews@derp.foo
- cross-posted to:
- hackernews@derp.foo
Ever wonder why cats love tuna? Well apparently a bunch of scientists did too, and they found the answer: the umami flavor (savoriness in English, I guess), is a cat’s most favorite (as opposed to mine, which is definitely sweet).
I wonder why we don’t eat cats
Meat from predators is very gamey - and an obligate carnivore like a cat would be the worst.
But reproduce like removed… It might be a good protein in poor countries
Cats are preyed upon, but we naked apes are particularly adept for hunting ungulates, since we can track and outdistance them by far. And that’s before we get into basic tools.
During colder periods when larger fauna prevailed, the atlatl or spear thrower was the pre-civilization elephant gun (we’ve tested them and with the strength of a common adult man, an atlatl can propel a javelin out the other side of an elk).
And for every cat we might find, we’d find twenty hares and twice as many squirrels.
We did in times of desperation. During the Blitz, the Brits would sometimes resort to eating roof rabbit, id est, stray cat.
It’s gamey and there’s very little meat for the effort so eating cat really is desperation fare. You might be better off training your kitties to hunt lizards and rodents and work out how to make them into a worthy stew.