{"id":516187,"date":"2010-04-05T13:23:02","date_gmt":"2010-04-05T17:23:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.marksdailyapple.com\/?p=11874"},"modified":"2010-04-05T13:23:02","modified_gmt":"2010-04-05T17:23:02","slug":"seasonality-for-the-birds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/516187","title":{"rendered":"Seasonality for the Birds"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Pheasant\"Last week, we determined a common thread of seasonality running through historical fructose consumption<\/a>. Warm weather with plenty of sunshine generally meant fruit was available. Those living in the tropics (as we humans did for most of our history) thus had year-round access to sweet fruit, while cold climate Grok<\/a> had seasonal, intermittent access. Plus, there are many symptoms shared between folks with vitamin D deficiency and fructose-induced metabolic syndrome. Eating fruit seasonally (if you\u2019re into that sort of thing) in the modern world, then, probably involves getting some sunlight with your berries.<\/p>\n

What about other clearly seasonal foods \u2013 can they be consumed freely and wantonly?<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

Consider birds. The bird is especially sensitive to environmental and seasonal fluctuations, as anyone who\u2019s ever been woken up by hungry birds chirping at the morning light can attest. You\u2019re all familiar with the \u201cflying south for the winter\u201d phenomenon, and you\u2019ve probably seen the highly efficient flying V formation employed by migratory ducks or geese.\u00a0 They\u2019re just following the food. Ever watch \u201cThe Endless Summer\u201d? It\u2019s like that, except with grubs and seeds instead of big waves. Not all birds are migratory, though. If they can stay put and get enough food to survive, migration to a warmer climate is unnecessary.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve been eating birds for millennia. They can be a bit hard to catch, sure, but the payoff is incredible: juicy thighs, fatty skin, delicious edible bones. And if you were to nab a big one like an ostrich or a wild turkey, that\u2019s dinner for a week! Birds are definitely seasonal, though, and depending on where Grok was living, bird meat wasn\u2019t always available. Does that mean poultry should only be eaten seasonally? Of course not. Meat is meat (well, dark meat is definitely not white meat, but it\u2019s all meat).<\/p>\n

What about the eggs<\/a>? Egg laying is absolutely seasonal.<\/strong> Birds are wired to lay eggs in warmer weather, when food abounds. Even birds that stick around all year long aren\u2019t constantly laying eggs. Grok undoubtedly loved eggs (he never had to deal with the egg yolk fear campaign), but he didn\u2019t have steady access to them. Still, if eggs are just another form of meat, there shouldn\u2019t be an issue with steady consumption of them\u2026 right?<\/p>\n

Maybe, but there\u2019s a bit more to the story.<\/p>\n

Remember that health issues with food generally arise when we eat food that really doesn\u2019t want to be eaten. Take grains<\/a>, for example. Grains house the little plant embryos; in order to deter consumption and ensure growth, the grain employs lectins and other anti-nutrients<\/a>. These are chemical self-defense mechanisms that can trigger auto-immune diseases and irritate the intestinal lining. Meat<\/a>, on the other hand, comes with claws and teeth and legs (and sometimes poison) to dissuade consumption. Once the animal is dead, though, it\u2019s dead. It no longer cares whether it\u2019s eaten, so dead meat is pretty safe to eat. Just watch out for the ostrich\u2019s legs when it\u2019s alive.<\/p>\n

What about eggs? Eggs are a different beast altogether \u2013 almost like a meat seed. A meat precursor. An egg has no active physical defenses (unless the mother\u2019s around). It can\u2019t sprout legs and run away. It does have the shell, which appears fragile but is actually incredibly resilient. Note the shape, which varies according to the nesting environment; cliff-nesting birds have the most conical eggs, ensuring a loose egg will roll around in a tight circle rather than roll off, while hole nesters produce more spherical eggs. Shells are meant to keep predators, faunal and microbial alike, away from the interior goods.<\/p>\n

If you get past the shell, there\u2019s another line of defense: the white. The egg white<\/a> serves three purposes.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It stores protein for the growing organism \u2013 about 50% of the total egg protein<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It helps transport nutrients into the growing embryo.<\/p>\n

It protects the egg from microbial attack.<\/p>\n

That last one is where things get potentially hairy for us egg-loving hominids who only had historically seasonal access to them. Because the egg is a stationary, otherwise helpless bird \u201cseed,\u201d it has selected for toxic, antimicrobial proteins in the white to bolster defenses. In fact, other than ovalbumen, which accounts for 54% of an egg white\u2019s protein content, the thirteen other proteins in a white are antimicrobial. They aren\u2019t explicitly meant to hurt mammalian interiors, but what harms the microbes can hurt us, too.<\/p>\n

Lysozyme is the most problematic egg protein, but in a strange, roundabout way. By itself, pure lysozyme is probably harmless. We even produce it in our own bodies. But because it has an alkaline isoelectric point, it can form strong bonds with other egg white proteins. It binds with the white\u2019s other protease inhibiting proteins, like ovomucoid or ovoinhibitor, to avoid digestive breakdown by protease enzymes, and it can form hardy, potentially harmful protein compounds that pass through the intestinal lining and produce or exacerbate autoimmune or digestive issues.<\/p>\n

Now, certain animals can adapt to chemical defenses, given enough time and exposure. Birds, for example, are wild seed-and-grain-eaters. They\u2019ve adapted to the lectins given their steady exposure to them. Primal folks eat a lot of eggs<\/a>. I\u2019m one of them, and I probably eat them five days out of the week. But how long have we been eating eggs year-round?<\/strong> The first fowl domestication probably occurred 8,000 years ago in Thailand with the red junglefowl, but I imagine year-round egg production took a bit longer to perfect. Have we adapted to year-round egg consumption?<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not sure. Egg white allergy is relatively common, ranging from between 1.6-3.2% of the population. According to Cordain, it\u2019s the second most common food allergy. That, plus the inherent purpose of the egg white itself, makes me suspect that there is something there. I don\u2019t think year-round consumption of eggs is a problem for most people; I just think that certain individuals may be sensitive to the egg white protein, while others can down them without issues. I have heard of people developing egg allergies or negative reactions in adulthood, but that usually happens with people who eat a ton of eggs. I don\u2019t hear about people developing lamb allergies.<\/p>\n

Egg consumption doesn\u2019t have to be seasonal, but our understanding of eggs<\/a> is informed by the seasons. Seasonality merely limited historical access to eggs, which in turn limited our ability to develop universal adaptations to egg whites. That\u2019s it.<\/strong> Frying up a scramble in the dead of winter may not be historically accurate, but who the hell cares? It\u2019s not the timing of consumption that matters, but the frequency \u2013 and even that isn\u2019t set in stone<\/a>. If you love eggs, don\u2019t stop eating them. They\u2019re a fantastic source of fat<\/a>, protein<\/a>, and vitamins<\/a>. If you have a preexisting autoimmune issue, though, filling up on eggs could make it worse. And if you start feeling like crap after every egg meal, you should probably ease up. Don\u2019t make eggs your primary protein source (I\u2019m talking five or six eggs each meal), and most of you should be fine. Just be aware that the ability to eat a dozen eggs every day is relatively novel, evolutionarily. <\/strong>I\u2019m not saying that problems will always arise when we introduce dietary novelties, or even that they\u2019ll be more likely to arise. I\u2019m just saying that they may<\/em> arise for some.<\/p>\n

(I find it highly ironic that the only thing you really have to worry about is the egg white<\/em>. Hmm, next time I\u2019m at a diner I\u2019ll try to order an egg yolk omelet. It might be even cheaper.)<\/p>\n

By now, it\u2019s clear that the seasons affect everything<\/em>: organisms (sentient and inanimate) respond to changes in temperature, rainfall, weather, availability of sustenance by adapting, migrating, or dying; certain geologic features are molded by rain, wind, or glacier, while coastlines are obscured or revealed by changing sea levels. It\u2019s not even so much that things are affected<\/em> by seasonality so much as they are imbued with it. You know how space and time are forever linked and wholly dependent on one another? How the two are contextual and relative? Think of the seasons, life, and this planet<\/a> the same way. It\u2019s all linked.<\/p>\n

Anyone have egg white allergies? Did you develop them recently, or have you always had them?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Get Free Health Tips, Recipes and Workouts<\/a> Delivered to Your Inbox<\/em><\/em><\/h4>\n

Related posts:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. The Question of Seasonality in Fructose Availability<\/a><\/li>\n
  2. The Question of Seasonality in Human Health and Nutrition<\/a><\/li>\n
  3. Egg Purchasing Guide<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

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    Last week, we determined a common thread of seasonality running through historical fructose consumption. Warm weather with plenty of sunshine generally meant fruit was available. Those living in the tropics (as we humans did for most of our history) thus had year-round access to sweet fruit, while cold climate Grok had seasonal, intermittent access. Plus, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-516187","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/516187","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=516187"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/516187\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=516187"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=516187"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=516187"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}