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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Willie the Duck" data-source="post: 9718460" data-attributes="member: 6799660">Who proceeded to think, "man, I'd really like to eat that otter or gull..." <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />As mentioned upthread, there might have been some 'nibble and see if you get sick' action instead of 'eat and see if you die.' Still, it's an amazing risk for very little sustenance. I guess a given prehistoric community only has to learn once for each variety. Of course, it's not really that far from the learning process of figuring out which snakes to run towards and which to run away from. This is similarly discussed with lutefisk. I guess a thing to remember is that most pre-industrial cultures would have ready (almost involuntary) access to alkali solutions in the form of fire-ash lye. Some ash is left in a pot and gets wet and people discover it's good for cleaning things (separately, or by treating fats with it). Next have _____ soaking in the thing (looking at wild corn, I can even imagine they were using it as a scrub brush) and realizing that it gets softened up. First time it happens, you swear a bit and throw your ruined corn brush to the pigs -- but then they eat it and look happy. Couple generations later you are cultivating plots of the stuff and looking for larger scale supplies of alkali and your friend over at the limestone quarry is complaining about wet days...</blockquote>

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