Buckeyes as famine food

Somebody in Trinity County insisted that native peoples routinely ate buckeyes. I countered and said that buckeyes were a famine food because the toxins were difficult to remove. What concerned me was that someone would read his comment as verbatim. And you can die from eating buckeyes. Sort of like eating oleander and there is no antidote.

He did not like my response and then proceeded to berate and harass me. When that happens, I copy my comments and then delete the thread from Facebook rather than feed his angst. Since he was responding to my comments, I deleted all his comments too. Score.

From a Facebook post. 

Buckeyes are a last-resort famine food, acorns are much easier to process, have more protein and are far less toxic. The only thing you need to leach out of acorns are the tannins—which is an acid, like in black tea. And they are highly nutritious. Hardest part is peeling them for leaching.

Double leaching won’t remove all the buckeye toxins. All parts of the buckeye are highly toxic, they contain the glycoside aesculin, a blood thinner, a saponin aescin, and more alkaloids. Not a mere case of getting rid of tannins. The glucoside aesculin is a toxic compound similar to glucocides in rat poisons. Most cases of aesculin poisoning occur when people roast and eat the nuts.

Aesculin poisoning symptoms include dilated pupils, vomiting, diarrhea, muscle weakness, paralysis, stupor and causes death to ruminants like cattle, sheep, horses, deer and humans. Only squirrels can survive eating them. Buckeye nectar is so toxic it kills non-native honeybees, “buckeyed bees” are deformed larvae. Luckily the nectar does not kill native pollinators. I don’t know if the pollen too is toxic, my guess is probably yes.

According to the Pomo elders I knew, buckeye required a lot of processiing to get rid of the toxins and was only used as a last resort if the acorns failed. And they’re also way less nutritious because you have to leech them so many times (up to ten baths). It could be that freezing and leaching removes some of the toxins but buckeyes raw are not good for any mammals. Sometimes a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

edited for clarity