[HPforGrownups] transfiguring food etc in DH

[k12listmomma]

No: HPFGUIDX 179262

Sharon:
It always bothered me that the trio found it so hard to find food when they 
were first running/camping in DH. They were apparating from rural place to 
rural place. Where were all the rabbits and other wild animals. Surely there 
would have been more than wild mushrooms? It was hardly winter when they set 
out -- it was really late summer. there should have been loads of edible 
plants around, not to mention fish in the streams.  That part about them 
living on nothing for days just never sat well with me.  What do others 
think?  Not having lived in Britain I am unsure about what they could have 
caught or picked, but it seems to me that England is hardly a barren place 
with no wildlife?


Shelley:
I think this is more a matter that the author hasn't the experience of 
hunting or fishing, and thus Rowling herself would have been out there 
starving, not knowing what is immediately available to eat. Or, she was 
trying to show that these kids were "city" kids, you know the kind who have 
always seen turkey frozen and sealed in a package, and chicken already cut 
up, so that they have never seen food in it's raw and alive state and the 
process to get it to the table? The wizarding equivalent might be "conjured" 
food, or whatever wizards do to normally get food. It's never really said 
where Molly gets the ingredients for her soups and gravies that come out of 
her wand. You would think they would know some spells for cooking, or 
Hermione have researched that part before leaving. At the stream, couldn't 
they have "Accio fish"ed?

Yes, that bothered me too, because for all the research Hermione did, I 
could see her taking along a book called "surviving in the wild", and 
referencing it during the trip to show Harry which mushroom and plants would 
make a meal, and how you would make a trap to catch a wild animal, and then 
following the directions to skin a squirrel. It would have been more 
realistic to have her make a not-so-nice looking soup of squirrel and 
mushrooms, only to have Ron complain that it wasn't mammaMolly's cooking, 
and then to have Hermione tell him off about it. Or to have Ron complain 
about having to skin the squirrel. Then it would only have been partly a 
matter of starving, but yes, as they moved around, but some areas would have 
been abundant in wild berries which can be eaten straight off the vine, but 
even in the darkest of forests there should be deer and squirrel, and near 
fields would have mice and other rodents. Even Sirius in the cave showed he 
was resourceful enough to catch rodents. You are right- that stream they 
stopped by one time should have had fish. An accurate picture would have 
been times of lean and times of plenty, depending on where they were, or 
complaints of eating the same things without the variety. But no, starving 
really doesn't make sense at all, based on the normal availability of wild 
things to eat, and the fact that they are wizards with spells to help them.

Even if Rowling has never had experience herself with camping or hunting or 
fishing, surely she could have researched this a bit? I think a more 
accurate complaint should have been no toilet to take a proper crap on, or 
lack of toilet paper (although wizard spells for cleaning might take care of 
that end?), or missing a nice hot shower or long soak in the tub. I could 
see Ron whining about missing all of the normal creature comforts that a 
warm home provides, such as fresh laundry and such, so that he was running 
Hermione ragged trying to make a nice place for them in the tent, but 
failing to match the comforts of a stable house.

My husband pointed out that they are only kids, after all, and their 
experiences have been academics with adults taking care of most of those 
other chores. There is a learning curve with surviving on your own, such as 
suddenly picking up all the work yourself, and realizing that if you don't 
clean your own clothes, for example, that they stay dirty. I could see Ron 
whining about suddendly having to do all this work- again stuff that 
mommaMolly always did for him, and Hermione telling him off about it because 
he was being such a baby about missing all the stuff that he took for 
granted before.