On Sat, 24 Nov 2001 09:27:03 -0800, Peter Brandt <[log in to unmask]> wrote: >Amadeus: > >I personally think that seeds (oily and starchy ones) and tubers are the > >*best* paleo food man can eat. *The* real ecological niche for hominids. >How about a little reality check on this alleged, past paleo-vegetarian >glory >of ours?... Here is what the Natural Hub >website has to say on the issue: > >http://www.naturalhub.com/natural_food_guide_grains_beans_seeds.htm > >"Seeds were seasonal. ..." 100% d'accord with what naturalhub said. One first lesseon to lear from this is variation over the year. If you look how the availability of vaious food groups for a savannah dwelling ape was, you see that seasonality is a common property. Still fruit and tree seeds have their season. Season for various fruit and nuts varies, but there is a time where none of these is available. At this time a fallback food is required. Rainforest primates have tree bark ,leaves, pith as the fallback food. That doesn't work in a savannah, this is why chimps, gorillas and bonobos don't live there. The field was left to australopithecines, the bipedal predecessors of homo. Open Savannah leaves a terrific good fallback food: USOs (tubers). This is what I told: seeds (oily and starchy ones) and tubers. Note that nuts are oily tree seeds. The mainstream anthropology thinks that the main fallback food for erectines was hunted game meat. I follow the tuber path, it seems more probable to me. However the bipedal hominids now walking upright into the heat of the day - with little fear of predators - have one more option to the gathering tubers. Predator leftovers - carrion. Particularly brain and marrow may have been available. You can estimate yourself how the chances for additional food energy were. Amadeus