In a sense, Cecil, you answered your own question with the reference to the “Last Supper,” (which brings up some interesting implications in and of itself.)
In Victorian times until the mid-nineteenth century, Guinea pigs were indeed used as lab animals for the same reasons rabbits were. They bred quickly, were easily handled, and they tasted delicious roasted, stewed, and fried with root vegetables. Most medical students and lab researchers, were (and are) not amongst the best-paid workers in our society, so access to the animal population of any given experiment was considered a perk of the job…particularly if they had simply been harvested for healthy parts. No sense wasting perfectly good meat, don’t you know.
As medical funding and PETA people proliferated, the use of animals that could be recycled became less of a priority, and various rat and mouse strains which could be genetically manipulated for specific testing requirements replaced larger, more edible species.
No longer a poor child of scientist parents, I nonetheless have many nauseating memories of dinners made from lab rabbits my father brought home from the Atomic Energy Commission where he worked during medical school. It is my sincere hope, (although my subsequent existance tends to indicate otherwise) that our dinners originated within the “control” group.
Hope this bit of information provides a bit of wonderment in you never-ending search for arcana.
When I was little, my father was a machinist. One day someone from a laboratory next door to his workplace came and asked if it would be possible for him to sharpen their syringe needles. He said sure, and they brought over bags of them for him to sharpen. Upon inquiry, the lab worker told him that they were using these needles on rabbits that, in those days, were used somehow for pregnancy tests. My father, being a West Texan, was appalled to find out they simply disposed of the rabbits after they were euthanized.
I didn’t find out until a few years ago that I ate rabbit quite a bit as a child.
You might be interested to know that laboratory rats and mice have gone the way of the guinea pig and also are not being used for experiments any more. At least one pharmaceutical company which does its own research has decided to use lawyers instead, for three reasons: one, the researchers found the rats and mice cute, and got attached to them; two, rats and mice are scarcer than lawyers; and three, they found that you can’t pay rats and mice to do just anything.
I’ve eaten Guinea pig (locally called cui) a couple of times in Cuzco, Peru. They’re quite tasty. The “pig” part of the name is no mystery, as they have a rind of fat beneath the skin much like a real pig. They are usually served whole, complete with head and feet, in a crouched position like a suckling pig. (Of course they are gutted). At one restaurant the cui was served wearing a charming fancy crown made out of celery. I’ve also eaten Paca (conejo pintado, a large jungle rodent, a few times in the back country here in Panama. It’s also very porklike and has a layer of fat beneath the skin.
I was just sittin here wondering, “When is Colibri going to weigh in and tell us what they taste like?” I also should have figured he ate Paca (capybera?).
Glad to be of help, Jill. No, Pacas are a lot smaller than Capybaras. They’re a very popular game species here (and throughout Latin America). From Mexico to Costa Rica they call 'em tepezcuintle. I wanted to try Capybara when I stayed at a guest rancho in the Venezuelan llanos, where they usually had them on the menu - it’s supposed to taste like beef - but unfortunately they didn’t have it on the days I was there. Guinea pig and Paca are by far the best of all the rodents I’ve tried (squirrel and muskrat in the U.S., and Maori rat in New Zealand). And no, Maori rats don’t taste like chicken. They taste an awful lot like rats, as a matter of fact.
I love you writing style Cecil. Let me share one thing I have heard. I can’t remember waht was said about the word Guinea, but I am to understand the pig part comes from the noise they make. I am sure you have heard them yourself. They do squeal like little pigs. Not that I would want to keep an actual pig in the house, (not enough room for two) but if I wanted the squeal, the Guineas would do. I think the neighbors would appreciate that also!!
Eww, you’ve eaten squirrel??? That has to be one of the more disgusting things I’ve read on the boards. My mom used to occasionally boil a few for the cats (Grandpap hunted them as vermin), and the smell was enough to drive every living thing out of the house, if not the block.
Now, groundhogs are another story. It wasn’t until many years later that my sister and I learned that most of the burgers we had at Gramma’s house weren’t beef.
I’ve got news for you, Chronos: groundhogs are squirrels. Big fat giant ground squirrels, but squirrels nonetheless.
Actually, IMO squirrel stew is a lot better than muskrat cacciatore or fricasseed rat. (And now I’ve been reminded of Frank Zappa’s album Hot Rats.) But I probably wouldn’t order any of them if they were available in a restaurant. Guinea pig, however, is one of the most popular items in the fanciest restaurant in Cuzco, and rightly so.
Another theory about the “Guinea” part of the name is that the locals sold them to hungry sailors for a guinea.
As to the rest of this thread…ARRRGH! I have, or have had, or work with, rats, mice, squirrels, possums, prairie dogs, pigeons and, of course, guinea pigs!
Guinea pigs are still used to develop anti-bodies (for protein assays). rabbits are more common, though. Producing anti-bodies doesn’t always kill the animal, and you can take it home n keep it as a pet afterwards (unless you bled it completely).
In pre-columbia medical tradition, the guinea pig is known as “doctor cui”. I was told by an old man near Huancayo in Peru that when he was little he’d had a terrible toothache.
His father had taken him to a tradional doctor who had held a guinea pig against face, later the guinea pig died and his toothache disappeared! They are also believed to take on psychic unhappiness, they soak it up and then they die.
Guinea pigs are folk heroes in Peru; they sacrifice their lives to cure your illnesses and unhappiness and you can eat them! I don’t know if they give permission for all this, but I have seen big groups of guinea pigs living in cosy pens and even though they do get eaten, they have a better life than a lonely creature kept as a pet in the west.
I’m an undergrad doing a thesis project at a Canadian university, and yes, I’ve wound up using guinea pigs. They’re quite popular among scientists doing work with the brain, because their brain develops before birth, like ours - rats develop after birth, so that’s a problem if you’re studying their prenatal development.
Personally, I like the guinea pigs because they’re nice ‘n’ big. Specifically, their brains are big for their body size. Believe you me, there is a MAJOR difference between dissecting a guinea pig brain and a rat one.
That’s, uh, probably more than anyone wanted to know.
No, 