You shoot it, you eat it! Weird things on the menu?

[Peter Wells]

A few years ago Magnum had an article about a guy who shot and ate a Hadida out of curiosity. He reported that , not suprisingly seeing they eat similarly, it tasted just like a Guinea

[Againstthegrains]

Rodents can be great!!! Porcupine, cane rat, rabbit (not a true rodent) ... yum!

[Messor]

Just on the topic.

I't not something that's natural in the wild, many animals kill something without eating it. Many even kill for fun.

You shoot it, you eat it, that is a human concept.

[pdh]

I draw the line at pests and vermin.

2 weeks ago I had to shoot some starlings out of the roof at the farm. When they were on the floor getting ready to be buried, even the dog didn't want anything to do with them, and he eats anything.

[MrK]

This philosophy has given me some interesting dining experiences. As a youngster with relatives who owned a huge farm in Southwest (Namibia nowadays) the boys would often take horses and a gun and head off into the wide blue yonder. The locals were not averse to eating most things that move and had great ways of preparing it. I recall eating tortoise (killed accidentally), ystervark and a variety of snakes. Puffadder, with a batter, fried in a pan is really quite good.

[pre 64]

Ddeswardt....The hadeda [or what we call common] ibis is what we ate as youngsters.Myself and 2 of the farm labourers youngsters would ocasionally get hold of one.The sacred ibis {black and white]inhabited a section of wetland on the farm and we tried once to eat it and it was no good.
The scarlet ibis we ate [40 odd years ago] was clearly not a scarlet ibis as per your explanation.I thought i had a reasonable grasp of most species of birds found in the country...i stand corrected after all this time.I do not think we get the Bald ibis in the eastern cape and it was definately not one of them.[i could also be wrong on their dist.range]

I now have no idea what we ate,thinking it was a scarlet ibis.[maybe a lost one? ]

[BiggerSteve]

Rodents can be great!!! Porcupine, cane rat, rabbit (not a true rodent) ... yum!

I have always wanted to try porcupine. What is it like?

[Koekie Monster]

I would draw the line with jackals, rats and other vermin. On hunting trips my dad tell my brothers and I to shoot a rabbit and give it to us as dinner with no other options. So we had to skin and cook it. I firmly believe if it is hunted it should be eaten. If not by yourself then by someone less fortunate.

[Sean Murphy]

Education for younsters on any such topic requires more than one or two hard and fast rules. Conservation is just too complex an issue to be approached in this way. I teach my kids that nothing should be killed uneccesarily. However, neccessity comes in many shapes and forms. There is the economic imperative. Animals hunted for proffit are conserved because they have value. Of course, anyone paying to shoot something is not going to waste it. I would not pay to shoot something I cannot eat.

However. The economic imperative appears in many ways. Crop farmers cannot afford to lose large portions of their crops to birds or other pest species. So, some things that cannot be eaten sometimes have to be killed. Not always with guns. It is unfortunate but is a reality. Millions of pigeons are shot annually. Many are eaten, many not. Jackel are shot by sheep farmers. Not too many get eaten. Trillions of insects get poisoned with insecticide. Is this any different. Where do we draw the line.

[CorditeCrazy]

Although 99% of my hunting is for meat, I'll be honest, I will happily hunt and not feel the need to eat what has been shot. I would happily shoot a baboon and not eat it. I would happily shoot a lion and not eat it.