#Entomophagy

[yellowbrickramble]

Do you know how hard drawing Venetian blinds is? Unfortunately, they existed in 1904, so I didn't have an excuse not to draw them.

Fans of the books might think I'm completely off track of the original plot at this point, but this is the point in Marvelous Land of Oz where Ozma, Jack, Scarecrow, & The Sawhorse flee Emerald City together. Everything's going according to keikaku.

If you like my comics, please support me on Patreon! (link in bio)

[onenicebugperday]

Lil strange ask but...

What do you think of entomophagy (practice of eating bugs as part of one's diet)?

Big fan, everyone should eat bugs unless they are allergic to eating bugs

[probablyasocialecologist]

"The countries with the highest consumption of insects are Mexico (450 species) [...] In North America, Mexico has the highest proportion of reported consumed insect species at 89%."

The global atlas of edible insects: analysis of diversity and commonality contributing to food systems and sustainability

[rattyexplores]

Hymenopteran Insect Infested with Fungi

Unidentified, class Sordariomycetes

31/08/22

[ratcandy]

also you can add chrysalises to the list of bugs i've eaten. they did not tell me chrysalises of What, just that they were chrysalises of some Vague Unknown Bug, but I sure did eat a bunch of them

[bumblechub]

let me walk you through the thought process on this one...😅 first, googling "social insects" (here's a good article on degrees of sociality in insects) ➡️ ended up on the ants wikipedia page ➡️ found the wikipedia page for honeypot ants ➡️ started ideation on what a good drawing of ants would look like ➡️ learned that some cultures eat honeypot ants ➡️ thought "wouldn't honeypot ant boba be a cool and funky future beverage??" ➡️ social insects as a drink you have when being social ➡️ here we are 😅 sorry if this is too "gross" for anyone, I just thought it was too cool of an idea to pass up lol👉👈

[wachinyeya]

Insect Farm Hatches Plan for Greener Animal Feed for Chickens and Pigs https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/insect-farm-hatches-plan-for-greener-animal-feed-for-chickens-and-pigs/

[moved2024]

Amber Candy and Fossil Cookies (not vegan, recipe includes cricket flour etc)

[tawneybel]

Thoughts on Fritz from "Frankenstein" (1931)? I know everyone has a crush on Dwight Frye as Renfield in "Dracula" (1931), myself included, but I admit, Fritz ain't bad either!

It took me a while to get around to watching Dracula even after reading it. SHAME. Even though I like Gothic literature and vampire media in general. If you haven’t seen it already, I recommend checking out the Spanish language version Drácula that was also released in 1931. 

Also, Universal Monsters: A Legacy of Horror. I read it earlier this year and I still need to finish watching the rest of the Universal Monsterverse.

Anyway, Fritz is kinda cute. And doesn’t eat live bugs. Even though he was super mean to the Monster. If I were there, I’d let him torment ME. 🤪 I have scoliosis so we could commiserate over our curved spines lol.

[sixth-light]

There's quite a few cheeses that are illegal in various places because they are made with unpasteurised milk (raw milk cheeses are legal but strongly regulated in NZ) but today I learned about the Forbidden Maggot Cheese which has a huge mafia-controlled black market. Truly human ingenuity is...something

[plushie-neopet]

Hmn

That's a choice

Its some sort of honey candy with petpetpets stuck in it, I suppose to evoke amber imagery...

There's a stick (weirdly off-centre) so it's supposed to be an insect lollipop.

It's definitely unique, especially amongst other candy pets, but the overall design is rather bland. At first glance it looks like the 'gold' colour... And I don't see how to incorporate that stick into the average customisation.

It's not really what I'd been hoping for in a candy Chomby, but perhaps others will fall in love with the weirdness or appreciate the 'trapped in amber' thing more. The base colour isn't awful really, so perhaps it will look nice with customisations that just make use of the warm colour.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Insects are eaten in 128 countries, according to a study published this year in the journal Scientific Reports, which found 2,205 species are eaten worldwide. Most of these species are in Asian countries, followed by Mexico, and African countries. In Thailand, India, the Democratic Republic of Congo and China hundreds of species of insect are consumed, with Brazil, Japan and Cameroon each eating 100 or more species. Singaporean chefs will be able to import many creative insect recipes from around the world, where they are served deep fried, on sticks, in noodles, in margaritas, in arancini, tinned, or confit. Insect products are sold round the world in restaurants, markets, supermarkets and from vending machines. The EU is in the process of approving more insects as what it calls a “novel food source”, but to date it has approved only four. Australiahas only approved three species – a cricket and two kinds of mealworm – so far as “non-novel, non-traditional” food sources.

[...]

Why does the UN want us to eat insects? Because it is crunch time climate-wise, and insects are a much more sustainable source of protein than livestock. They have a high “conversion rate”, which means they are efficient at turning plant energy into protein, or in other words, turning what they eat into their own bodies. “Crickets need six times less feed than cattle, four times less than sheep, and twice less than pigs and broiler chickens to produce the same amount of protein,” according to the FAO. They can also be farmed indoors, use less space and water, and produce lower emissions. Because they can be farmed in rural and urban areas in relatively small rooms, they can also be a source of income for people who have less access to land or the training needed to farm livestock.

10 July 2024

[rattyexplores]

The caterpillar-attacking fungus

Of course this isn’t the only kind, but it’s native to this area (Far North Queensland).

Metarhizium rileyi

31/05/21, 30/08/21, 07/08/22, 09/09/22

[ratcandy]

what's the best bug to eat (there is a correct answer)

Ok well let's see. I've eaten mealworms (live and Not live), crickets, grasshoppers, and ants. Personally, I don't like the taste of most bugs. The texture is Bad. It makes me go ooguhghr ACK BLEGH

The crickets and grasshoppers I had were both dry and therefore pretty bad. The ants I had were ... fine? I mean they were pretty tasteless. I ate quite a few of them and didn't really have much opinion either way

Mealworm-wise, plain? Boring. Live? Bad. But there was one time I had them served to me with some sort of spice on it that I forget the name of. And THEN... THEN they were pretty damn good. I wish I remember what the spice was, but dam did it suddenly make those mealworms tastey

I need to ask the person who fed them to me what that spice was actually maybe I need to just start eating mealworms more often

[dyke-pollinator]

Best and worst food you've ever had

Best: anticuchos from a very authentic Peruvian restaurant in South Central FL on the gulf coast.

Worst: the shitty ass insect cookies we made from mealworms during our entomophagy course in college. We fucked it up so badly. There were pieces of exoskeleton in the flour. I honestly don't know how we ruined it like this but it wasn't even close. Tasted like absolute garbage and was WAY crunchier than a cookie should have been.

[arctic-hands]

It's telling that the only bugs I have actually eaten were either mealworms with no legs or ground up crickets. I swear to god my entomophobia and arachnophobia stems from the damn legs. I don't even like looking at living crustaceans, tho I do enjoy eating crab and especially crab legs so who knows. Maybe my enjoyment of crab meat stems from a vendetta against arthropods