Monday, April 4, 2011

Elephants eat Salads - Herbivores vs Carnivores



- Elephants and cows eat grass (salads) to get fat. Lions/tigers etc would eat meat and no matter how much meat they eat they will never get fat. Counting calories is simply ridiculous and nonsensical. Elephants get their fats from salads and not from fat. Your body creates its own stuff. Horses don't gain muscle mass by eating protein (wild horses). Each animal is unique, the diet and physiology changes. Hence remember, eating fat will not make you fat, or eating cholestrol wouldn't make your cholestrol high. Chickens don't eat cholestrol but produce eggs which are high in cholestrol. So the whole point is whether your body is creating its own stuff from other stuff or is it using the stuff already present in the diet. 

- Herbivores/carnivores have two different modes of eating. Herbivores have to eat a lot of salads (grass) and then have to do a little regurgitation as well. Most herbivores just eat the whole day non-stop. Carnivores are different, they just eat after a high intensity hunt and then rest most of the time which requires no eating, a carnivore is either starving/resting or is feasting. 

- Humans are part carnivore and part herbivore (omnivore). Hence you can graze all day on salads but have a big high intensity feast of meat/fish etc at the end of the day. And remember, eating cholestrol does not increase cholestrol in your body. If that were the case, then elephants only eat salads and should be the slimmest in the group. Try and understand how your body has evolved rather than fit man made theories.

- Remove foods from your diet which are not traditional, just imagine what human diet would be a few thousand years ago when there was no agriculture and tamed animals. No cow milk, no bread, no rice etc but lots of fruits, vegetables and game meat. 

- Workouts should be high intensity and short. Not low intensity and long (jogging). That is why carnivores are so muscular. A lion would only hunt and work out with intensity in a short burst once every two days and then doesn't even bother to get up. But he gains a lot of muscle mass. Just try and differentiate between a carnivore/herbivore diet and work out and you'll get added insights.

2 comments:

  1. Quiet interesting.I re-collect Swami vivekanada a saint from India draws a comparison between an carnivore and a herbivore animal,as to the ferocious nature of the tiger is attributed to their food and most of the herbivore animals are calm and timid in nature.

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  2. @Priya
    Although food source and how it is acquired (or environment in general) has an effect on behavior in general but a lot of herbivores are not really timid and calm. Elephants, Rhinos, Bulls are known for their aggression and often go on killing sprees.

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