It smells (and tastes) a lot like copper.
Honestly, though, how many people don’t know what blood smells and tastes like? We all get injured, right? We all lost teeth as children, I’m sure. A whole lot of us have to deal with injured people and animals, if only on an informal basis.
Anyway, the interesting thing is noticing when other things smell and taste like blood. The last time that happened to me was when I handled a really coppery rock. One whiff and I immediately thought of blood.
Do we have a lot of copper in our blood, if any? Or is that smell we identify with pennies and copper actually iron?
I thought you could only smell that at the Hotel California.
Ok, now that’s funny!
I remember when my brother wrecked his motorcycle. There was a lot of blood on hot pavement. I swear I could smell the alcohol evaporating out of it. I’ll never forget it.
Human blood contains very little copper. Our oxygen transport works based on iron, part of the hemoglobin molecule, which goes from dark red to light red in the presence of oxygen. If we were horseshoe crabs, say, or vampire squid, we’d have hemocyanin, which is both based on copper and is undeniably blue (as opposed to just looking blue in our veins through our skin based on how light bends).
I don’t know how that adds up to human blood smelling and tasting so much like copper.
There is a copper containing compound in our blood, called ceruloplasmin. It doesn’t contain a whole lot of copper, but yes, we use copper in our blood.
But I’m pretty sure pennies don’t contain a whole lot of copper anymore, do they? This has always puzzled me. Why does blood smell/taste like pennies, specifically? Not like nickles (which also contain copper) or quarters or a wrought iron fence (which would make sense if it was the iron in the hemoglobin we’re smelling) …but pennies. WTF?
Gangrenous bowel is worse than that, IMHO. Necrotic bowel is nasty, but necrotic bowel plus gangrene transcends feces + death + blood.
So, then, what does Vulcan blood smell like? Rusty nails?
You win.
For me, nothing like a splenectomy on a 150+ pound dog to get real familiar with the smell of blood.
I guess I haven’t spent enough time in colic surgeries; I’ve seen a couple cases with purple to black gut, but it still didn’t smell as bad IMO as the ones with raging Clostridium infections which were coating the walls with the smell of bloody death. It may have to do with proximity and ventilation in the surgery suite (very airy) vs isolation stalls (which tend to get stuffy and warm sometimes). YMMV, but I’ll take your word for it on the gangrene. I’ll take horses over people with rotting diabetic feet any day, though.
Couldn’t say. I’m not particularly fond of Scotch, nor liqueurs. I lean more toward Rum or Vodka.
I’ve noticed that certain smells are never forgotten. Years later, when you smell it, it’s instantly recognizable, and not intellectually, but almost like a shift in time, revisit to the first moment. And some smells are so distinctive that they’re not confused with anything else.
Do you know of any medical students who had to bail because they couldn’t stop barfing at the vile effluvia that accompanies so much illness? It’s a serious question: we all know about the cliche of people who faint at the sight of blood, but what about the people who hurl at the scent of pus?
And I really wish there was a less gakky word for pus…I have a visceral response to language and I need a euphemism…
“Purulent discharge.”
What I’d like is an adjectival form of the word *pus *that can be used in writing without looking like the slang term for a female body part. Fill in the blank: The infected wound was swollen and _______. Works in speech, never in writing.
This thread made me order up a rare steak from room service…they asked how did I want it done…still mooing, said I.
Mmmm, fresh, bloody steak…‘I used to weep in butchers’ shops as a boy,’ said Uncle Monty.
Fascinating!
Suppurative or purulent? Haven’t heard a professional use pus-sy except as a joke, just clients. Merriam-Webster on the use of purulent:
And suppurate = to form or discharge pus.
Oooh, suppurative is a superlative choice! 
I ran into the pus-sy problem in charting. My teacher wanted direct quotes (also known in nursing as “subjective data”), and the patient described her wound as, well…y’know. I was at a loss as to how to chart it accurately. :smack:
Just before I found my present job, I spent some time running the tongue saw in a slaughter house.
Fresh human blood, ah yes, I know the smell; a moist rusty scent, not too disagreeable.
Unfortunately I also know the smell of rotten human blood, it’s probably the most vile stench I’ve ever encountered; I shouldn’t wonder if there’s a genetic or evolutionary element to that.