Why raw bugs and fruit is all we ever need to eat for optimal health with no cost

Is there anyone here who is currently farming bugs for raw consumption? I am about to start with meal-worms trying to farm them i large enough quantities to use them as main protein source every day for an experimental period. It is my strong belief that raw bugs and fruit is all that is needed not only to survive but to achieve optimal health. I would like you to try and give me a reason other then the standard "it is grose" for why a diet in bugs and fruit would be worse than any other diet out there.

Honey from bee
Grasshopper/locusts
Fruits

Personally I would eat some vegetables and nuts too.
Overall a bug and fruit only diet does not resonate with me.

Chiton allergies is the only reason I can think of...

Some (crickets, for example) carry parasites. Did you see the response to "The China Study" on the WAPF website? He said one of the things they didn't take into account when they looked at low-protein diets were the insects the people ate in the field as they found them, the study didn't ask whether they ate insects so they didn't report eating them.

Peter Menzel has a fascinating book, "Man Eating Bugs" that discusses the different insects people eat in different parts of the world.

I read in Mexico there was an effort to get the people to eat ants to increase the protein in their diet. It didn't go over well. In parts of Africa they make pies out of ants.

Only flaw with the mealworm idea is that they can only be as nutritious as the food they eat. So while wild bugs may contain more parasites and possibly pesticides, the home-grown ones may be lacking. If they're only for protein, tho, it may not matter.

Henrick , other than the "gross" aspect I can think of many reasons why a diet of bugs and fruit would be worse than others. Monotony is one . Personally I could eat bugs , but I will save them for sheer survival situations . Where I live it is just as easy to catch a fish as it is to dig up a grub. We have more surface water than any state in the union. In counterpoint , may I ask why you think a diet of bugs and fruit is better than others ? I need to restrict my diet some , but why such a severe restriction ?

I've always planned to hide under a brush pile and live on bugs in the off chance that zombies take over.

If that fails to occur, I plan to continue eating a wide variety of tasty non-bug things.

The classic permaculture answer to all questions like this is "it depends". A staple diet needs to not only be adequately nutritious, but also regionally appropriate, so as to minimize long-distance transport. The Eskimo diet, almost completely animal based, is the classic example quoted by omnivore permies to counter fundamentalist vegans and their ilk. And, if there are fruit and insects in Eskimo land, they are only there for a few weeks a year, whereas seals, walrus, caribou, and so on are to be had the year round.....

The Inuit hate being referred to as Eskimos. Eskimo is a name assigned to them by the Cree. It means "eaters of raw meat."

It depends on where you live.

Anything that grows/lives naturally in that area. The macrobiotic principle is similar to permaculture ethics. I love the idea of a macrobiotic diet as it advocates no or little meat in the western world, like here in the uk. And as someone else mentions the inuits diet is natural to them as there would be little in the way of grains growing.

protein is good. as with fruit. but what about no grain consumption? our staple diet is supposed to consist of mostly grain according to the macrobiotic experts, they never mentioned eating grubs, as far as i am aware, being mostly macrobiotic myself, i would be cautious of too much protein as grains provide slow release energy in their whole form. but saying that, if its free then give it a go!!

good luck.

We can grow a wide variety of foods in Kentucky. We also grow alot of bugs. They are free but I am still not eating them . I can handle the idea that my fresh fruit might contain a few bugs , no problem . I have seen ants run out of blackberries as I readied to pop them into my mouth . Look out below ! Still no problem . As far as plucking bugs and serving myself a plate of them - to paraphrase Dale - I am saving that for when I have gone crazy and am hiding in the bushes because I think zombies are attacking . I let the chickens pluck the bugs and then I eat them.

What Wayne said about feeding bugs to chickens. The conversion ratio of grubs to chicken protein is pretty good, though I can't find my references at the moment. Same goes for grubs to fish protein. Actually, the direct conversion ratio of grub chow to chicken protein is only about 1.6 times less than the conversion of grub chow to grub protein. I'd rather gather 60% more grub chow, then cut out the middle critter and feed it straight to a chicken. Not only do you get good healthy protein, but you get eggs too. Chickens also make better pets than grubs!

Other points:

- You don't have to eat grubs to eat grubs. Dry them and grind them into flour. Presto! A storable powder that can be added to lots of recipes without anyone even knowing that grubs are present.

- A grub is pretty much a protein and mineral/vitamin factory. A chicken is too, along with being a much better source of needed fats. However, unlike grubs, chickens also create a number of byproducts that are valuable in in their own right. Feathers for instance. I'd rather lay my head of a feather pillow than a pillow filled with grubs.

Henrik, your thread title is "why raw bugs and fruit is all we ever need to eat for optimal health with no cost".

I would be interested to read why you believe this, which is what your thread title suggests you are going to tell us. So far you have only said you believe it, which is not giving the basis for your belief.

I have to say that "no cost" is not an accurate statement. Everything has cost associated with it. Everything. Gathering insects takes time and energy, those are costs. Growing trees and collecting fruit has costs.

But I am curious to hear the reasoning behind your belief.

Dale Hodgins wrote:The Inuit hate being referred to as Eskimos. Eskimo is a name assigned to them by the Cree. It means "eaters of raw meat."

The Inuit also dispute the characterization that they only eat meat. Berries and greens have long been eaten in season and preserved in quantity for year 'round consumption, lactofermented or packed in seal oil. I have a copy of a book about it entitled Plants That We Eat:

http://www.alaska.edu/uapress/browse/detail/index.xml?id=394

I see the OP has never been back.

First when too many people eat too many of these small critters it would be very damaging to the ecosystem.
Second I guess it is very unhealthy. Like all extreme diets. There was this German lady I think Ruetting she was called,
proclaiming that raw food and only raw food is good for you, the end was she died very early of cancer.
In the end eat everything, avoid processed food keep your sugar intake low, grow what you can, get the rest of a good quality that's it.

Yesterday, even though it is cold winter, I noticed some ants on my floor. Because of this thread I thought I might as well try them. The crunch was nice but I was not partial to the flavor.

The good thing is, I feel confident that even in a serious disruption to the food supply, my family will not starve. I bet we will get pretty tired of sunchokes and ants though.

I don't know that raw is healthier and is often very bad, limiting our healthy nutrition choices significantly. As to eating bugs, most cultures that eat or ate bugs processed them in some way, especially for storage. Insects were a major source of food in the arid and semi-arid regions of North America. There is a humorous story about some explorers stumbling, half-starved, onto an an abandoned Paiute camp. They found sacks of food which they proceeded to gorge themselves on. A little later, the Paiutes came back to camp and the explorers learned that the little fatty globules they had been feasting on were brine fly larva. Most of them suddenly became sick and emptied their stomachs.

In the Great Basin, besides brine fly larva, crickets and grasshoppers were collected by the ton after having been driven into traps. The Goshute called shrimp, sea grasshoppers. Wars were fought over control of stands of trees where the larva of a particularly moth could be found. A major trading commodity were the dried sugary excretions of mites on marsh reeds which were shaken onto mats and then pressed into balls of sugar, peppered with mites.

It was a hardscrabble existence, but it was an existence.

I prefer the idea of feeding insects to animals that are more culturally palatable. If I had to, I could probably make an adjustment to eating insects directly, but only if I have to.

Certainly insects have been an intentional part of human diets in prior cultures. Our modern sensibilities make it difficult for us to consider seriously, but that is all they are, sensibilities. Insects are not inherently less edible, more unsanitary, etc. than are the members of the animal kingdom we are accustomed to eating.
I have seen some evidence regarding nutritional profiles of some insects and they are not bad.

Thing is, in my view, we are built to eat an enormous variety. We can process all sorts of material and gain nutrition from them. And we should go for a good variety if only for the security/resiliency that comes with variety.

Terri Matthews wrote:I see the OP has never been back.

Maybe he starved to death?