Animals Eat the Weirdest Things

Steve Pitt is a Toronto-based freelance writer and an award-winning journalist. He has written many young adult and children's books, including Day of the Flying Fox: The True Story of World War II Pilot Charley Fox.

The front cover of this book shows a porcupine gnawing a boat paddle.
The reader subsequently learns that rats like to eat elephant toenails,
rabbits recycle their own dung pellets, wolf pups regularly dine on
vomit, and vultures can stomach meat so rotten it is oozing enough
poison to kill a hundred people.

In fact, anything goes in the animal world. Nature writer Diane Swanson
points out that the world would be a very crowded, smelly place if there
were no animals that regularly ate wood, cloth, excrement, carrion, dead
skin, rotten antlers, regurgitated flesh, sweat, bones, eye mucus, pus,
and blood. Each “weird” food subject is described in its scientific
context, such as the fact that porcupines chew canoe paddles because
they enjoy the taste of salt in human sweat. The illustrations by Terry
Smith are outstanding for their ability to depict animals in their
natural settings. Highly recommended.