“Pigeon milk”??? The lady said pigeon milk?
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/lab-rat/how-to-milk-a-pigeon/
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Next thing you know they will be milking… uh… plants! Imagine milking a soybean, oat grain, almond or cashew nut!
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wait…is he happy or sad about milk?
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So, a spider that is a better mom than the vast majority of vertebrates and even horns in on one of the key, defining characteristics of mammals, the very characteristic that gives the class its name. This might actually be the most delightful and uplifting story I have seen all week, which says something about the week.
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Spider milk… (for some people anyway) … nightmare fuel
(Not me though, I’m going full St. Francis on all kinds of animals)
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Spider poutine.
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The fries in poutine made me think of the deep-fried tarantula dish they have in Cambodia. This made me wonder: would spiders served in spider milk be kosher? But then I realized that spiders probably aren’t kosher by themselves. It turns out they’re not just un-kosher, they’re super not-kosher; apparently even spider silk isn’t kosher. (Whereas even though bees aren’t kosher, honey is.) So spider milk definitely isn’t kosher either.
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So weird that there would even be rules about this sort of thing.
But Spiders in Spider milk would def not be kosher. Spiders probably rank with shrimp etc… as arthropods, so not kosher?
Has there actually been a ruling on spider silk? What sort of weirdness had to happen to get that sort of rabbinical review? I can’t imagine that they’re just sitting around making up weird scenarios to rule on. “Are aliens kosher?” “Dude, I don’t know… pass the bong… wait… do these aliens lactate?”
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spider milk and sir. bacon, sounds like breakfast is served!
A little more detail in this article, including better descriptions of pigeon and cockroach “milk.”
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Thank you thank you thank you! Something new to waste my time on!
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“Scenes From A Multiverse” is truly a most bingeworthy site. He has a certain twisted view of the world that I greatly appreciate.
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Yeah, insects/arachnids/arthropods in general aren’t kosher - with the exception of a few species of locust (and, even then, according to what I’ve read, which particular species are controversial, apparently). But apparently spiders are extra not-kosher - rabbinical tradition holds that of creeping creatures, they’re “the most hated.” So its products don’t get the same exception that bees get with honey - spider silk is explicitly called out as not-kosher and there are a bunch of rules about removing webs from the home.
I’m amused by the interplay of adherence to the letter (while ignoring the spirit), adhering to the spirit (but not being too bothered about the letter), rules-lawyering, practicality and indifference that happens when these kinds of religious rules get updated. (Such that they end up with rules about not doing work on the Shabbat, for instance, getting interpreted in weird, seemingly random ways so that labor-saving devices are forbidden, causing people to do a bunch of unnecessary work… in order to avoid doing “work.”) Copepods found in drinking water (e.g. New York city) are technically not kosher (except apparently there’s some rules-lawyering about whether they’re sufficiently “part of the water” that can act as a get-out clause), but most people who keep kosher apparently just can’t be bothered to avoid them. I suspect there’s already been some speculation about aliens, and it breaks down into “are they like Earth creatures? Same rules apply,” and “the texts only talk about creeping creatures of the Earth - if there are spiders on Mars, I’m chowing down!”
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