Trying to answer my 9 year olds carnivore question. Please help!!!!?

My daughter has yet again stumped me with one of those fasinating questions, You know the ones where you dont actually know the answer to yourself. The one where you begin to question too.


Humans eat a variety of meat including Cow's, sheep, pigs, chicken, fish etc.


Have you noticed the main diet of the animals (not including fish) seems to be plants,grain ect. The main question here is : Do humans actually eat and animal which is a carnivore ( eats meat) as a major part of its main diet?


In UK we do not eat cats,dogs,tigers,bears,lions etc.


Can anyone answer this please.


I tried to explain that humans have domesticated cats and dogs. I have no idea why dont eat tigers, lions, bears etc. ( not that I would ever want to )


Any one out there with a better explanation for my daughter??

Trying to answer my 9 year olds carnivore question. Please help!!!!?
When our ancestors were hunting, they obviously preferred to hunt animals which they could kill using a spear or a bow and arrow etc., and thus they started eating deer, pigs and so on. They were naturally avoiding lions, elephants, tigers etc., which could kill them (elephants are vegetarians and don't eat flesh, but they may kill when angry). The largest animals which humans tried to eat are the camel and the ox.





As they started settling down and succeeded in domesticating animals like cats, dogs, oxen etc., they avoided killing and eating them because the animals are capable of showing their emotional distress and the same human being who raised the animal can't kill it too easily. So, the meat was coming from a professional who doesn't raise the animal.





Coming back to your question, men do eat cats, dogs etc., in China, Korea etc. And in times of starvation, they eat almost anything which is available.
Reply:By the by, prehistoric man have been said to hunt wooly mammoths for food, skin/fur, bone/ivory by driving them over the edge of a cliff. So man have eaten larger things than ox and camels. Report It

Reply:We do eat pigs, which will eat anything, including meat.
Reply:I really have sympathy with you having been dumped with this question. It is one I have been struggling with for years myself. I shudder when I think that people kill poor sharks and octupus etc to eat, yet I am quite happy to eat pig etc.





I read the answers hereunder and I would say you must go with the one from THE ONE WHO KNOWS - I think it will explain it to your child in a good way. Children are sensitive and we have to be careful about putting tthings in their minds at these young ages!! So, dear friend, go with THE ONE WHO KNOWS and be careful how you explain it. I WISH I could give you a decent answer but I am struggling with the question myself.........
Reply:I agree that why we don't eat very many carnivore animals is because it is easier to catch and breed herbivores. Another reason could also be it's easier to keep bags/bales of dry feed around for animals then to keep a supply of fresh meat. But I do believe that ducks and chickens eat bugs and stuff does that count? Wild pigs will eat eggs and domestic pigs get fed slop which has meat and other icky things not fit for people. There is also alligator, snake, lizard meat for some people.


Oh they joy of the 9 year old mind :)
Reply:For you're information, dogs are the domesticated form of wolves. We don't eat cats, dogs, tigers, bears and lions because they are an endangered species, we keep them as pets and generally, people these days don't want to risk death by an unknown disease with all the recent pandemics. In the past, humans didn't really want to have a taste testing job with the invention of machines.
Reply:We don't eat meateaters because they could be toxic to us. Even cannibals don't eat humans on a regular basis! :)
Reply:we predominently eat herbivores, there will be few cases where we may eat another omnivore, or carnivore, for example crocodile. There are very few examples i can think of though, and shark is a fish,
Reply:I suspect that to hunt a carnivorous animal is dangerous and more difficult, and just not done. It's so much easier to herd and kill cattle than it is to hunt down a lion.





But then again, dog and cat meat are eaten in some cultures. In some parts of China and Indonesia, dog meat is considered a delicacy, as is snake in China.
Reply:I thought this link gave me a really good answer to your question...check it out :-)
Reply:carnivore herbavore or omnivore. We are omnivores. We probably dont eat carnivores , because they can kill us. This is a good question.
Reply:Blimey... Well lets see:





Rabbit


Chicken


Turkey


Cow


Pig


Duck


Deer





In general are all herbivores.





I've eheard Croc is pretty rubbery and cr*p. Shark is nice. I can't think of anything else we could eat that is a carnivore. Good Q.





Your daughter is a smart girl. :)
Reply:In the main, apart from shark eaters, we tend to eat animals that have been domesticated, over thousands of years - ones that are easily 'tamed', herded, and are easy to keep - it's that same all over the world (think of the Masai with their weath displayed by herds of cattle). I think it would be quite difficult to keep a cageful of tigers with the idea of killing them to eat! Good question, by the way!
Reply:Apart from fish (incl shark) I don't think so. It would probably be difficult to domesticate and tame to the extent of being dinner. Alot of what we eat and don't eat is based more on societal views and 'ethics'. We don't really eat to many animals we can find other uses for. Common people Eating Chickens and sheep is reasonably new especially in the UK. A sheep would become lunch when it had no further use providing wool, cows and chickens were the same. Unless of course you were wealthy enough not to care about when you would get eggs next or how your milk got there. So carnivores were trained to act for mankind's benefit and are mostly to small to be individually a meal for a family. And you wouldn't kill a hard worker for no reason even if it was an animal.





However you know what causes Mad cow disease don't you?
Reply:Chicken are omnivores with a strong tendency to carnivores, as all birds are to my knowledge - given the chance they eat worms and grubs and mice and other protein-rich food. Our image of the grain-picking hen is that of a domesticated animal that goes for second best, as their natural diet is not available in sufficient quantities inside chicken pens etc.
Reply:Wonderful question.





Think in terms of the food chain. Predators obviously come on top of herbivores. The densities as we go up the chain also become less. For example, for a tiger to live, it has to kill at least fifty medium-sized herbivores like deer. For the tiger to sustain year on year, there should be a good breeding population of the deer and because of that the tiger commands a territory where thousands of these prey species live. In the Indian forests, it's been said that for every two tigers tiger, there are three leopards, and a couple of thousands of small to large herbivores (kinds of deer and buffalo).





Obviously, herbivores occur in high densities and that's why they are a common target for most predators. However, it's been proven (with photographic evidence) that tigers kill other predators given a chance and it's a common occurrence for leopards in rural India to live off domestic dogs and cattle! So predators do eat other predators. Likewise, humans in various parts of the world eat predators like snakes, dogs, crocodiles, apes (a kind of bush meat in Africa), fishes (several of which are carnivores). However, most kinds of predators are non-palatable and only eaten in rare circumstances.





So, the ordinary behaviour for meat eaters is to eat what is in plenty and it's usually the herbivores and some kinds of predominanatly plant eating omnivores like pigs.
Reply:the thing is that it is not economical to sustain a 'herd' of carnivores for humand consumption.... firstly because of the space, as carnivores work in groups, not herds, and therefore woudl take alot more space. the main problem being that a carnivore requires alot of meat to sustain it.... a cow eats alot of grass which is 'free' and available, but a lion would need at least one cow a week to sustain it.... that is alot of cow for one animal.... then in order to sustain the human demand for lion to be main stream you would need more lions than we currently have cows as they are smaller, you would then end up with 50 times as many cows as we do today, and an ecological disaster not only in providing land to sustain so many cows and lions, but cow is known to be already contributing to the ozone hole.


however, for the benefit of a child it is probably best to say that carnivores eat alot, but are very small, so we don't make them for food because it is too expensive. but it is possible to get it in some countries, where a wild animal like a lion or crocidile can be eaten, but that is a special thing.


you can compare it and say that a dog eats and chicken a day.... so it is alot of chickens to get one dog ready to eat, better just eat the chicken and save the dog. incidently dogs are a normal food chain food in Korea. freely available and freshly killed. awful i know, but it happens.
Reply:We eat the animals that aren't wild and could do us harm ,years ago man would've went out and hunted dangerous animals but was finding it hard to not come back umharmed ,so they went for the cow and pig,chickens easy to look after and keep for food.
Reply:coz we tend not to eat the more bigger animals. think about it chickens cows sheep and over small animals that wont hurt us humans are lazy and chose to onli catc them.
Reply:It is generally accepted that humans can eat meat from animals that sweat through their skins the same as we do
Reply:Yes man does eat other canivors,wild pig have a taste for meat.In many parts of the world people eat snakes,lizards,dogs the list is endless and includes bears by the way
Reply:we eat shark





I can get you some rare tiger meat also, if you want ...
Reply:Just think of the carnivores as the pinnacle on top of a pyramid, with their prey (herbivores) beneath them in a wider part of the pyramid and the plants (food of the herbivores) forming the wide base of the pyramid.


One very simple answer to your question is that carnivores are not as abundant as herbivores and it would be a waste of a hunter's time and energy to go after something rare and dangerous, when so many herbivores hang out in herds and breed like rabbits. Where carnivores are eaten (eg cats and dogs in China/Korea) it's because they're domesticated and bred in captivity.
Reply:In Florida - we eat fish known as bass -


which is a carnivore - eating bream and minnows





AND they are terrific fun to fish for - a bad day fishing is better


than a good day at the office





we also eat Gator tail - and gators don't eat plants - sometimes they


try to eat us!
Reply:Here in the united states a lot of people like to eat bear meat.


Many animals are omnivores and eat anything they can. One of these is the beaver, and the tail of the beaver is considered a delicacy. Most fish eat other fish. Another thing most people don't know is that chickens love to eat raw meat and blood. They will often peck a chicken that has been hurt to death, and eat the flesh.
Reply:When human beings were hunter gatherers, they would eat any animal that came there way and one that was relatively safe to hunt. All carnivorous animals do the same. they take care of their own safety first. Once human beings moved on to being settlers, hunting for food was no more needed and they took to animal husbandry. (Rearing animals for food and other human needs like leather, wool etc.) Dogs, for long have been hunting partners and guardians of human beings. So have been cats by keeping the menace of rats in control.
Reply:Not all carnivores but some we do eat just check it out.


http://www.exoticmeats.com/store/index.p...
Reply:some countries do eat dog such as vietnam





pigs will eat meat if it is fed to them... if you get slop on the back of one the other pigs will eat it. not a pretty sight.





i think it is just a matter of prefferance but yes we do eat animals that eat meat, just not common in most cultures.

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