# What did the animals eat on Noahs Ark? What did they eat after they landed? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 22, 2006, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478 "2006-11-22T22:47:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2006, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/41 "2006-11-23T17:11:54Z")
[QUOTE=Lou Stool] Poly, According to the Bible, Ham was sent away by Noah cursed to be a black man. You should look up the Curse of Ham. . . . I believe that was edited out of the newer versions of the Bible. [/QUOTE] No. It was misinterpreted INTO some poor bible stories by people who needed to claim that Africans were inferior to Europeans. Here are the descendants of Ham according to the King James Version, [Chapter 10](http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=1&chapter=10&version=9&context=chapter): Cush, and Mizraim, and Phut, and Canaan. Note that while Ham is the one who committed the sin, it is only one of Ham’s sons, Canaan, who is actually cursed. There is nothing in the bible (and has never been anything in the bible) about curling hair or “increased size” of his “manhood.” So claims that Ham’s sin resulted in the curse of Africans ignores the fact that Ham was not even affected by the curse and that the three sons who had dark skin were the ones NOT cursed. All that happened was that later, when some people were desperate to rationalize their enslavement of dark-skinned people, some clown noted that one of Ham’s sons happened to wind up associated with a specific African place (Cush to Nubia) and exclaimed (totally distorting the actual passage) “_AHA! We are justified in our brutal behavior because God already cursed these people!_” However, it is not in the bible and never was. Here is a two part [Staff report on the drunkenness of Noah](http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mdrunknoah.html)[and the Curse of Canaan](http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mdrunknoah2.html). ---
**Author:** ![wisernow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/13edae/32.png) [@wisernow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wisernow)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2006, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/42 "2006-11-23T17:39:16Z")
[QUOTE=Lou Stool] If there were only two of each animal, what did the carnivores eat after the boat landed. How big would the boat have to be to load every animal species on the planet? Two times. [/QUOTE] God waved his stick and lo and behold…all aboard the ark stopped feeling hungry! Problem solved. I feel sorry for the guys who wrote those stories. Had it been me, I would have at least made sure that all questions and loopholes were covered. With God on my side to do the explaining, that would be so easy. Just one answer to all questions of whys and hows = Don’t be an idiot asking questions!! The moment a question pops in your head answer it yourself with this - “GOD WILLED IT!!!” Period. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2006, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/43 "2006-11-23T17:42:55Z")
[QUOTE=Polycarp] Ham, by the way, is depicted as more than a bit perverse. After the Flood, Noah plants a vineyard and gets stone drunk (reasonable, he’d been doing the Ark-building thing for years and then spent something over four months on stormy seas during the Flood). Ham discovers him and has his way with his own daddy. (See Genesis 9:20-29.) He’s probably the one who was the reservoir for the STDs. 🙂 [/QUOTE] It’s really kind of unclear: 21 And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent. 22 And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without. 23 And Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their father; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father’s nakedness. 24 And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done unto him.Did Ham rape his father, or catch him in the act of jerking off, or what? We don’t know; the author leaves the point ambiguous, perhaps deliberately so, to indicate that God (via his proxy in this case) can be merciful, but only if you catch him on a good day; otherwise, he’s likely to smite you, or encourage you to throw your virgin daughters to an unruly mob, or somesuch. New Testiment God seems to have discovered lithium and moderated the mood swings a bit. LDS God…now he’s a hoot. Overall, though, I think the Hindu gods are a lot more fun to hang with, and plus they shave and don’t walk around all day in their bedclothes like a patient in a mental institution. And they’re not nearly as uptight about the whole sex and nudity thing. A great bunch of guys, really. Anyway, assuming that Ham “had relations” with Noah, whatever infections he carried couldn’t have been too deleterious, as Noah lived for another 350 years after. But the whole worldwide flood business is suspicious, like one of those things parents set up just to teach their children a lesson. Methinks that God just plunked Noah in the middle of a large lakebed, filled it up, and let him sit for a few months just to make him more inclined to settle up. Quite an environmental impact for little reason. Couldn’t he just find a one-armed man and have him fake losing a limb? “And that’s why we don’t yell on the boat.” Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Terrifel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c68b51/32.png) [@Terrifel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terrifel)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2006, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/44 "2006-11-23T18:05:41Z")
[QUOTE=tomndebb] All that happened was that later, when some people were desperate to rationalize their enslavement of dark-skinned people, some clown noted that one of Ham’s sons happened to wind up associated with a specific African place (Cush to Nubia) and exclaimed (totally distorting the actual passage) “_AHA! We are justified in our brutal behavior because God already cursed these people!_” However, it is not in the bible and never was. [/QUOTE] The Ambrosius Bible says nothing about it. However, it does mention a similar incident: > [@](#): > > 1. And Noah awoke from his wine, and saw what his youngest son’s dog had done all over him. > > 2. And Noah said, Cursed be the dog of Canaan, above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; because thou hast done this, a servant of servants shall thou be, and upon all fours shall thou go all the days of thy life. > > 3. And the dog of Canaan said unto Noah, I already go on all fours, thou drunkard. > > 4. And Noah said unto the dog, Bite me; whereupon the situation deteriorated further. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2006, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/45 "2006-11-23T18:22:42Z")
[QUOTE=Terrifel] The Ambrosius Bible says nothing about it. However, it does mention a similar incident: [/QUOTE] I find your ideas intriguing and would like to subscribe to your newsletter. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2006, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/46 "2006-11-23T18:27:24Z")
[QUOTE=Terrifel] The Ambrosius Bible. . . . [/QUOTE] Not _exactly_ an original text. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/47 "2006-11-24T03:37:14Z")
[QUOTE=Terrifel] On the other hand, modern archaeology has confirmed that the inhabitants of Noah’s Ark had access to soy products, as evidenced by that one chunk of the Ark recovered a few years back that was soaked in teriyaki sauce. Presumably the Ark’s crew (and possibly some of the animals) subsisted largely on a diet of marinated fish similar to traditional Japanese or Hawaiian cuisine. This seems appropriate somehow. [/QUOTE] Except there is one further problem…how did the fish (that Noah et al were presumably catching) live? 😛 Oh sure, lots of dead ones right off…but after a few weeks they wouldn’t be very appealing I shouldn’t think. The story really only would make sense to someone who didn’t realize how big the earth was, or what flooding it out would REALLY entail…or how many species are out there. If your whole world was the ME with perhaps an inkling that there was an Asia, Africa and Europe out there somewhere (probably no bigger than your little patch in the ME), then flooding it wouldn’t be such a chore…and there wouldn’t be all THAT many animals about (maybe a thousand or so species). -XT ---
**Author:** ![Terrifel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c68b51/32.png) [@Terrifel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terrifel)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/48 "2006-11-24T04:28:38Z")
[QUOTE=xtisme] Except there is one further problem…how did the fish (that Noah et al were presumably catching) live? 😛 Oh sure, lots of dead ones right off…but after a few weeks they wouldn’t be very appealing I shouldn’t think. [/QUOTE] Well no doubt the fish were smoked, brined, or lightly salted to preserve them in some fashion. Regardless of the specific details, Occam’s Razor demands the most parsimonius explanation for the verified presence of intradiluvian teriyaki sauce. ---
**Author:** ![WonJohnSoup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f17d59/32.png) [@WonJohnSoup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WonJohnSoup)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 8:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/49 "2006-11-24T08:25:45Z")
A “clean” animal was an animal that was cloven hooved and chewed its cud. As for how the animals ate, didn’t the story say they “hibernated,” so to speak, for most of the trip? P.S. Don’t try to guess what religion I am or whatever. Just trying to help clear some things up. ---
**Author:** ![Pushkin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ee59a6/32.png) [@Pushkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pushkin)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 9:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/50 "2006-11-24T09:14:07Z")
How many different ways are there to serve fish? ---
**Author:** ![JacksonRoykirk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e79b87/32.png) [@JacksonRoykirk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JacksonRoykirk)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 10:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/51 "2006-11-24T10:15:13Z")
[QUOTE=Revenant Threshold] I suppose for the first few days they could have collected the floating bodies of the sinful. [/QUOTE] So, they ate…SOYLENT GREEN? ---
**Author:** ![Pushkin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ee59a6/32.png) [@Pushkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pushkin)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 11:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/52 "2006-11-24T11:19:29Z")
[QUOTE=Lou Stool] So Noah sent him off to Ethiopia to start the black race. Turned his hair curly, inflated his lips and **increased the size of his manhood** [/QUOTE] And the last bit is punishment? Especially bizarre considering the reason why Noah cursed him in the first place 😛 ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/53 "2006-11-24T12:24:31Z")
[QUOTE=Polycarp] According to the Genesis account, Noah took into the Ark his own wife, his three sons (Shem, Ham, and Japheth), and their wives. Hence, no incest – at least until the next generation, when the assorted children of the three sons and their wives (see Genesis 10; Japheth is said to have had 7 sons, Ham 4, and Shem 5. As usual in eponymic genealogies, no daughetrs are mentioned. Genesis 6:21, by the way, specifies that Noah loaded the Ark with edibles for humans and animals – which begins to make the Tardis theory reasonable. 😉 The point to the whole story, of course, is that God can get wrathful and smite those sinners, but His providence will always provide for the righteous (Noah & family), including preserving the creatures of wood and field for their herds, hunting, and pleasure. Ham, by the way, is depicted as more than a bit perverse. After the Flood, Noah plants a vineyard and gets stone drunk (reasonable, he’d been doing the Ark-building thing for years and then spent something over four months on stormy seas during the Flood). Ham discovers him and has his way with his own daddy. (See Genesis 9:20-29.) He’s probably the one who was the reservoir for the STDs. 🙂 (And the Google ads are promoting flood protection policies and such and workers’ comp compliance in Louisiana – which makes me wonder what the Google search engine knows that we don’t! :D) [/QUOTE] I wonder Poly, Were the infants and little children also sinners? The innocent animals were not given any mercy either,God didn’t seem to spare them. I would say one could translate the meaning of the story any way to fit one’s thinking. To live in such cramped quarters for nearly a year in the extremely humid conditions that would have prevailed while 20,000 feet of water evaporated would be quite a feat in it self. Monavis ---
**Author:** ![E-Sabbath](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e19adc/32.png) [@E-Sabbath](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-Sabbath)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/54 "2006-11-24T17:17:21Z")
And, just for light entertainment, speaking of fish, all the freshwater fish and plants would probably be dead. Or all the saltwater ones, your call. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2006, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/55 "2006-11-26T18:07:47Z")
[QUOTE=Revenant Threshold] Sorry, your Excellence. What was your punchline? [/quote] You beat me to it, RT. Hence the “tromp on my punch line” complaint. :mad: ---
**Author:** ![monavis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e0b2c6/32.png) [@monavis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monavis)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2006, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/56 "2006-11-26T18:43:04Z")
There is always the problem of how many plants could survive under 29,000 feet of water for nearly a year. How did they pollenate etc…Plant eating animals would have nothing to eat for some time, and non swimming animals would have quite a trek crossing the oceans… The story is a fable not fact. Monavis ---
**Author:** ![Apos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/838e76/32.png) [@Apos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apos)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2006, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/57 "2006-11-26T18:44:48Z")
I wonder what Noah did about asexual animals. Where are you going to find the male and female of a whiptail lizard? They reproduce by parthogenesis: there are no males. Worse, what about the parasites? The number of parasitic species dwarfs non-parasitic ones, but for them to survive into the modern day given their very specific host needs, each animal pair on the ark must have been crawling with virtually every parasite their species could still support today, including those that are quickly fatal. That includes the humans. That by itself is pretty implausible. The frogs had every species of frog liver fluke all at once, including all the other parasites they can get, and still lived through the journey and thrived afterwards? How many different tapeworms were on the ark, and in Noah in particular? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/9fc348/32.png) [@The\_Flying\_Dutchman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Flying_Dutchman)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2006, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/58 "2006-11-26T19:52:15Z")
[QUOTE=Polycarp] After the Flood, Noah plants a vineyard and gets stone drunk (reasonable, he’d been doing the Ark-building thing for years and then spent something over four months on stormy seas during the Flood). [/QUOTE] I can just imagine the viablity of vines never mind all the other 100s of thousands of plant species after four months of global inundation. And what about the dinosaurs. They could get pretty mean and big and there were lots of them. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2006, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/59 "2006-11-26T20:00:40Z")
[QUOTE=Skald the Rhymer] You beat me to it, RT. Hence the “tromp on my punch line” complaint. :mad: [/QUOTE] Ah, gotcha. Doubly sorry then, O Exalted one. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2006, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478/60 "2006-11-26T23:13:42Z")
[QUOTE=E-Sabbath] And, just for light entertainment, speaking of fish, all the freshwater fish and plants would probably be dead. Or all the saltwater ones, your call. [/QUOTE] This one is easily dealt with: some fish are very tolerant of variable salinity. (Yes, I’ve actually seen that argument used in earnest) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-the-animals-eat-on-noahs-ark-what-did-they-eat-after-they-landed/381478.md?page=4)