Thanks for the reply, man. When I was a kid, my dad ran a hunting lease for his customers. One guy was Chinese-American, and one day we killed a 5+ foot rattlesnake near the cabin. Mr. Chen slit it open, pulled out the gallbladder, squeezed it into a shotglass, added vodka & threw it down. I was impressed. Looked quite nasty though. You're right that snakes aren't endangered, I pretty much typed that without thinking. Good to hear that there's some form of crackdown on the bear & tiger market, I hadn't heard that. As to the elephants, yeah, I was talking about ivory specifically. From what I've read, Asia is the major desination market for poached ivory. Shark populations are down worldwide, but especially so in certain species, and overfishing is the culprit. So I'm not a big fan of shark as food (swordfish as well). I'm not exactly sure what shark species are used as food in Asia, you have any ideas?
Actually the direct OPPOSITE is true. A lot of whale species (Orca, Baleen) eat zooplankton which are the largest threat to phytoplankton. Zooplankton species generally are the largest consumers of phytoplankton and those are checked by whales.
Where is the Iron Chef when you need him? He would knwo how to make a 7 course meal along with a whale salad, whale bread, and an icecream made from the bladder of the whale.
Actually I have had whale meat, both raw sashimi style and fried. Raw sashimi style whale meat is very very fatty/oily. Think of it as almost a raw type of red meat and add lots of fish oil to it. I guess some people like the taste and texture. I thought it was a bit too rich. I would imagine most Americans would find it quite repungent especially those who don't like umm fishy fish. Now deep fried whale I thought was pretty darn good especially in small quantities (usually served in Japan like fried nugget style). That being said I am still not sure about the whole whaling industry and process.
Orca eating plankton? I don't think so... one look at their teeth will tell you those won't be filtering out tiny organisms but grabbing and tearing large chunks of flesh. Also, baleen whales named for the plate-like structure that does the filtering of krill/plankton from sea water and are a suborder that include blue, humpback, gray and right whales. The name Baleen is also the name for the suborder they belong to.
Interesting thread. Due to work and other concerns I've had to limit my Clutchfans time but I'm glad I glanced at this. I honestly don't get why the Japanese persists in whale hunts. Yes its true its a cultural heritage but do they really need that much whale especially if the market is glutted or is the whaling industry of that much value to Japan? I could see them hunting a few a year and larding that up with ceremony for the old timers who still got a "yen" for whale but hunting on an industrial wide scale just seems like a waste and as noted in the article brings bad publicity too. I heard that in the Pacific Northwest a Native American tribe has revived an annual hunt for Grey Whales but they only take one a year and seem to be doing it to revive their traditions. The article I read about it also implied that most of the people in the tribe when they tried the grey whale hated it since most of them were born after the hunt was banned and few had were alive from the days when whaling was a vital part of their food source. It seems like the situation in Japan and is similar and the solution could be too. Just have a ceremonial hunt to keep tradition going and stick to harpooning cows, chickens and pigs. Also great Iron Chef references and I would love to see the Iron Chef Battle Whale if they ever did one. Gentleman, ALLEZ CUISINE!
