Early Hominids Ate Tree Bark

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by Mackenzie U., a student of Environmental Conservation Studies. She believes in the possibility of Bigfoot and is hopeful that one day scientific methods will help prove its existence.

Scientists have found evidence that one of our early ancestors may have eaten tree bark, similar to chimpanzees. Though it is unlikely that bark was the preferred food for Australopithecus sediba, it would have helped to sustain them:

Bark may not have been the hominins’ first food choice: modern primates tend to eat it only when tastier food is unavailable. Perhaps, the researchers suggest, these early humans had to deal with drought or a similarly stressful environment.

The cambium layer of bark has even been a food source for modern man. The Algonquin people used to be called ratirontaks, which means “they eat trees” by the Mohawk people as a derogatory name. Later on in the 1600’s, the Mohawks started calling English and French people ratirontaks as well when speaking to the Dutch. Over time, ratirontaks was Anglicized and this term became the name of the region where the Algonquin people were located. We call this region the Adirondack Mountains.

Here is a video showing the art of bark gourmet (FYI, not all bark is edible and many are poisonous, so be safe and don’t try this at home):

 

[via: blogs.discovermagazine.com]