This time Scott made sure to provide his men with fresh seal meat, and scurvy was not a problem in the main camp.
One of Scott’s goals for the winter journey had been to determine the proper ration for sledging up on the Polar plateau, where the men would have to hike for several weeks at altitudes above 10,000 feet. After some tinkering with proportions, the men on the Winter Journey had settled on a satisfying ration, and Scott decided to adopt it unchanged for his own trip later that year: Scott’s Polar ration: 450g biscuit, 340 grams pemmican, 85g sugar, 57g butter, 24g tea, 16g cocoa. This ration contains about 4500 calories (sledging requires 6500) and no vitamin C.
You said they brought ‘tonnes of limes’ and got scurvy despite that.
No, I know, that’s what I’m curious about, haha. I think the expedition is a red herring here.
For all my searching, I can only turn up sources that say limes are less effective than lemons, and lemons are less effective than oranges, and all citrus is less effective than fresh mammal meat, particularly liver. I can find sources that say the vitamin c breaks down when heated, so the navy’s switch from fresh limes to canned lime juice made things worse around the age of the steam ship.
I cannot find sources that say limes don’t work to prevent scurvy, and was wondering if you did.
that’s why i linked the article! the bulk of it is about limes. they did animal testing in the 1920s (before the discovery of vitamin C) and found that
lime juice is about 25% as effective as lemon juice at preventing scurvy, when fresh, and
its efficacy was reduced by being in contact with a) air and b) copper, which means the open-face copper tanks used to store the stuff at sea was… not well thought out.
basically, as it was used by the british navy it was completely useless.
well i mean the fact that they used limes were also part of the problem, since lemon juice could actually handle those conditions. so everything else being equal they would have seen increased rates of scurvy, but the steam age saved them.
Could it handle those conditions? I was under the impression that all vitamin C degrades with exposure to heat, light, and air. I’m not seeing anything that suggests lemon juice is immune.
This blog doesn’t support your claim at all.
You said they brought ‘tonnes of limes’ and got scurvy despite that.
in my defense it was primarily supposed to be a fun fact about limes and steam ships.
No, I know, that’s what I’m curious about, haha. I think the expedition is a red herring here.
For all my searching, I can only turn up sources that say limes are less effective than lemons, and lemons are less effective than oranges, and all citrus is less effective than fresh mammal meat, particularly liver. I can find sources that say the vitamin c breaks down when heated, so the navy’s switch from fresh limes to canned lime juice made things worse around the age of the steam ship.
I cannot find sources that say limes don’t work to prevent scurvy, and was wondering if you did.
that’s why i linked the article! the bulk of it is about limes. they did animal testing in the 1920s (before the discovery of vitamin C) and found that
basically, as it was used by the british navy it was completely useless.
Right. The problem is not that they used limes, it’s that they did a bunch of stuff to neuter the effectiveness of the limes.
well i mean the fact that they used limes were also part of the problem, since lemon juice could actually handle those conditions. so everything else being equal they would have seen increased rates of scurvy, but the steam age saved them.
Could it handle those conditions? I was under the impression that all vitamin C degrades with exposure to heat, light, and air. I’m not seeing anything that suggests lemon juice is immune.
as i read it it wasn’t immune, it just took longer.
I’m sorry, I probably should have linked what I was looking at earlier!
This suggests that limes and lemons do not degrade at a markedly different rate. Arguably, this is under modern refrigeration, and not the conditions on a 1900s era sailing ship, but I haven’t seen a source for that yet. I think your namesake is a bit cooler than you’re giving it credit for, haha.