SURVIVAL-FOOD IN

Although you can usually live several weeks without food, you do need an adequate amount to stay healthy. Without food your mental and physical capabilities will deteriorate quit rapidly, and you will become weak. Food replenishes the substances your body uses and provides your energy. It provides the calories, fat, minerals salts, vitamins, and other, elements necessary to optimum health. Just as important, it helps your morale. the two  sources of food are plants and animals (including birds, fish, insects, reptiles, and sea-food). You can, with relatively few exceptions, eat anything that crawls, flies, jumps, travels by jet propulsion, runs, swims,or that walks.
Both animal and plant food sources provide all the calories, carbohydrates fats and proteins needed; but a diet of pure lean red meat, and nothing else; will quickly kill any animal on earth, including man. You also need fibre, in order to survive. Even strictly carnivorousness animals need plant and other fibre; which is why small animals are eaten whole and with larger animals, the intestines first. This is also why all PET FOODS contain plant fibre. Man CAN NOT LIVE on meat alone.
Calories are the measure of heat and potential energy in foods. The average person needs 2,000calories per day to function. An adequate amount of carbohydrates, fats  and proteins without an adequate caloric intake will lead to starvation and self cannibalism of the bodies own tissue for energy and will also, eventually, kill you. 

Food Sources:
If you live in North America and especially if you live in the U.S.A., you probably do not eat a lot of vegetables, not nearly enough (the one exception being potatoes) so, as a novice in survival knowledge and techniques; you are very likely to overlook them in an actual disaster/survival situation..
 When you think of food, in all likelihood, you think of meat, any kind of meat,red meat, white meat, lean meat, fat meat; any meat JUST SO LONG AS IT'S MEAT..Every North American knows that mammals are excellent protein sources and the most tasty food source. Rich red meat is always the first choice of the" REAL" North American man or woman. The very thought of  a real hunt, the opportunity to kill large game, especially other mammals, the chance to obtain real meat--red meat, heats up the blood, fires-up the imagination and is the subject of many a pulp novel, Hollywood film, legend, myth, and other pure B.S.
  
Historically all aboriginal/tribal cultures, especially in survival situations, which was always, have eaten almost everything imaginable for food and nourishment. I guess they were not real HE-MEN.
 You in a disaster/survival situation must LEARN TO DO THE SAME as our ancestral forefathers; you can not afford to pass up an opportunity to obtain food, even in Canada,you may not get another. anyone who ignores an otherwise healthy food source due to ignorance or personal bias, or because he feels it is unappetizing--"I DON'T LIKE THAT" is unlikely to survive for more than a few days. Although he or she may see it as a difficult choice anyone in an actual survival situation  must use what is available-- All of Nature's Pantry--in order to maintain his or her health and in order to survive.

Plant Food Sources:
Plants are always, always, always, I could add a few more but I think I have used the word always enough that you get the idea.
Contrary to popular belief,pound for pound, plants are no less nourishing than meat and are in fact, much more beneficial to the body--even in the Arctic--where animal fats are often considered to be essential
.Plants are probably the fourth most abundant life-form on earth, some claim they are the most and this may be true, in any case, they are readily--especially in Canada--available. Plants can and do provide everything that is necessary in a food. Historically, the largest animal that ever lived; have been animals that ate strictly plants--they still are the largest and strongest. Unlike many of the so called carnivores, they were and are also very mobile.
Fish 
Fish represent a good source of protein and fat. They offer many distinct advantages, to the survivor, in an actual disaster or survival situation. To start with, identification is not overly important, because there are no poisonous fresh water fish.  They are usually more abundant than mammal wild life. They are available year round, They are often easier to catch.
 Light often attracts fish at night. Fish will also gather where there are deeper pools. In a heavy current, fish will rest in places where there is an eddy., such as near rocks or submerged foliage. fish will also gather under cut overhanging banks over hanging brush, and in and around submerged logs and any other objects that offer shelter.
They are usually smaller and there fore easier to handle. They can be processed in the same ways and they have just as many uses as the meat of mammals.
Fish tend to feed heavily before a storm. They are not likely to feed immediately after a storm, when the water is still muddy and swollen--they will wait until the water clears and food is more abundant. This can make them a little harder to catch at these two times.  
Insects 
Argued by some to be the most abundant life form on earth--they are not--that honour would go to bacteria, various one celled animal/plants and of course plankton (the food on which the largest animal that has ever lived) the Blue Whale thrives.
Insects are easily caught. Insects provide 65 to 80% protein compared to 20% for beef. This makes insects an important if not always overly appetizing, food source.
Insect to generally avoid  include all adults that sting or bite), hairy or brightly coloured insects,   (ants their larva, bees and their larva, are often eaten) caterpillars that become insects, insects that have a pungent odour, such as bed bugs, and insects that are known to carry disease such as ticks flies and mosquitoes. Spiders are not insects; but avoid them anyway.
Decaying logs lying ont the ground are excellent places to look for a variety of insects including ants, termites, beetles, and various kinds of grubs (which are beetle larva).Do not overlook insect nests on or in the ground.Grassy areas, such as fields, are good areas to search because the insects are sometimes easily seen. Stones, boards most other materials (avoid asphalt) lying on the ground provide insects with nesting sites. Insects such as beetles and grasshoppers/locusts, that have a hard outer-shell will have parasites. Cook them before eating;(remove any wings and barbed legs also but, most are are edible. Most insects can be eaten raw; they can also be incorporated into vegetable or otherl soups and stews. Some ants and bees store  honey in or on their bodies and have a very sweet pleasant taste.

Worms (Annelidea)
Are not just for kids: to freak their parents out, prove how brave they are or to chase girls; they are a clean, excellent protein source. Dig for them in damphumis soil or watch for them on the ground after a rain, when they come up to breathe. After  capturing them, drop them into clean potable water, to wash of any outside earth, for a few minutes. the worms will naturally purge or wash themselves out, after wiich they may be eaten raw or cooked.

Animal 
Meat is another important source of food; any source is important.
However in order to obtain any meat: you will require equipment. Man was not equipped by the mother to be a hunter. He has no built in armour, can not climb as well, dig as well, is not as fast, can not fight as well, can not hear as well,  is not as strong, and his body does not come pre-equipped with any weapons.
Any animal can inflict injury on another animal. All mammals have have teeth and all will bite or attempt to bite in self defence. Even those, soft and cuddly, rabbits and squirrels, can inflict a serious wound; and any bite, any puncturing of the skin; from any mammal--any insect, anything presents a serious risk of infection. Any living creature will fight when attacked or cornered. Any female mammal will fight to protect it's young. The amount of injury an animal is likely to inflict is in direct proportion to it's size.

NOTE: After a natural disaster, or whenever you find yourself in a temporary survival situation, usually you do not want to focus your attention on trying to "bag" any of the big game animals. In fact doing so can be very detrimental to your chances of survival; as not only will you attract carnivores animals and other scavengers to any killing site; but you will attract potentially dangerous carnivorous insects (hornets, yellow jackets etch.). You will also be presented with greater difficulty in butchering, drying/preserving, packaging, storing, and transporting any meat that you do manage to harvest. 
Very few people today know how to properly skin an animal, clean, preserve, scrape, soften, stretch,or tan a hide or animal pelt, and, even if you number among the few that do have this knowledge; you will probably not have the time or willingness to expend the huge amount of energy and labour necessary to do so. Consequently, any skins or hides will be virtually useless. Survival hunting is not trophy hunting--you will NOT be looking to collect any prizes or trophies. You will not be in a "REALITY" TV series; the situation you find yourself in will be real--LIFE OR DEATH. 
 In a survival situation, you WILL BE looking for smaller animals--primarily members of the rodent family.
While all mammals are edible, all parts of all mammals are not. the polar bear and bearded seal can have toxic levels of vitamin A in their livers and the platypus (native to Australia has poisonous glands; and some mammals can carry diseases; which is why the new meat regulations require the removal of the spine and back bone from all beef carcases, why the brain is no longer sold, and why the heart and liver is carefully inspected.

Man is omnivorous, originally man was basically vegetarian;  then he became a scavenger, finally a hunter with little actual hunting abilities--to this day, he must rely on technology to have much success. Therefore in a survival situation, it is best to confine yourself to seeking the much more abundant, definitely easier to butcher, easier to catch, easier to carry, easier and less dangerous to hunt, much less dangerous themselves, easier to eat, easier to find, easier to kill, easier to dry, easier to keep, easier to package, prepare for eating, easier to store, easier to transport from the hunting killing site (remember, the smell of fresh blood is going to attract other  hunting and scavenging animals) easier to use for food. It is always best, even if large game is seemingly available, even if you do get the occasional opportunity to kill a large game animal; to confine yourself to the hunting, snaring, or trapping of small game, in ANY survival situation --you will be much more likely TO SURVIVE.
It is often claimed that the North American Native used all parts of an animal and, this is probably true at least I'm not going to dispute it; but, he he did not and could not use ever part of every large game animal he might manage to kill. He took only the choicest cuts of meat, what was most wanted or needed, and only what could by carried on foot (remember, until the coming of the first Europeans, the North American natives had no beasts of burden). Tribal cultures were interested in their own survival; they were not interested in conservation; they did not even know the word.