every one of you have no idea what you are talking about. no one yet knows where probiotics come from. or how they get into a new borns gut. the stumic acid kills all the probiotics you eat wicth is a god thing because the is one way the body protect it self from other pathigens. eating food that helps support probiotics will not kill off the bad crap in your gut. unless you go on a extream diet like keto and you have a yeast over growth.

if you do have a imbalance in you gut the best way would be to buy probiotics that form groups in your gut and not just pass through. and use them in a enema

there's enteric coated probiotic pills that are supposed to not get their coating removed till they hit your intestines (the 'Pearl' marketed probiotics found in some stores are usually this kind, every other brand I've seen has just said enteric coated on the front instead.)

basically the coating is extra thick or acid resistant so the payload isn't destroyed by your stomach acid.

Getting this kind can help keep you from wasting money on non effective products, that said some of the fermented whole foods (Kefir etc) are tasty too.

"There is between 100 million and 3 billion bacteria in one gram (1g) of healthy top soil."

I think Grok would have been ingesting huge amounts of soil/organic matter when you consider the lack of cleaning, living in a house, etc

The problem with probiotics is that you ingest them orally. This means they have to pass through the stomach, the acidity of which probably kills the bacteria before they get to your gut where they can conceivably do some good.

Getting good flora in your gut is more complicated than simply eating or drinking something with bacteria in it.

The link to the Quote from "Wholehealthsource.blogspot.com"

Strategies: Gastrointestinal Health

Since the gastrointestinal (GI) tract is so intimately involved in body fat metabolism and overall health (see the former post), the next strategy is to improve GI health. There are a number of ways to do this, but they all center around four things:

1. Don't eat food that encourages the growth of harmful bacteria
2. Eat food that encourages the growth of good bacteria
3. Don't eat food that impairs gut barrier function
4. Eat food that promotes gut barrier health

The first one is pretty easy: avoid refined sugar, refined carbohydrate in general, and lactose if you're lactose intolerant. For the second and fourth points, make sure to eat fermentable fiber. In one trial, oligofructose supplements led to sustained fat loss, without any other changes in diet (5). This is consistent with experiments in rodents showing improvements in gut bacteria profile, gut barrier health, glucose tolerance and body fat mass with oligofructose supplementation (6, 7, 8).

Oligofructose is similar to inulin, a fiber that occurs naturally in a wide variety of plants. Good sources are jerusalem artichokes, jicama, artichokes, onions, leeks, burdock and chicory root. Certain non-industrial cultures had a high intake of inulin. There are some caveats to inulin, however: inulin and oligofructose can cause gas, and can also exacerbate gastroesophageal reflux disorder (9). So don't eat a big plate of jerusalem artichokes before that important date.

The colon is packed with symbiotic bacteria, and is the site of most intestinal fermentation. The small intestine contains fewer bacteria, but gut barrier function there is critical as well. The small intestine is where the GI doctor will take a biopsy to look for celiac disease. Celiac disease is a degeneration of the small intestinal lining due to an autoimmune reaction caused by gluten (in wheat, barley and rye). This brings us to one of the most important elements of maintaining gut barrier health: avoiding food sensitivities. Gluten and casein (in dairy protein) are the two most common offenders. Gluten sensitivity is widespread and typically undiagnosed (10).

Eating raw fermented foods such as sauerkraut, kimchi, yogurt and half-sour pickles also helps maintain the integrity of the upper GI tract. I doubt these have any effect on the colon, given the huge number of bacteria already present. Other important factors in gut barrier health are keeping the ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fats in balance, eating nutrient-dense food, and avoiding the questionable chemical additives in processed food. If triglycerides are important for leptin sensitivity, then avoiding sugar and ensuring a regular source of omega-3 should aid weight loss as well.

Speaking from personal expierence taking care of your gut is important and even if our ancestors didn't use fermented food as much, I think their gut also had to deal with less damaging foods than we do. Kurt is right when he says metabolism first, history second.

Florian

Microbial communities are incredibly competitive, especially those in high energy (food) environments like an animal gut. With generation lives of twenty minutes, tiny metabolic adaptations in bacteria can quickly lead to dominance within a day. The species composition of microbial communities can radically alter to optimally consume nutrients whenever the environment changes. For example, starving gut flora of simple sugars will quickly swing the composition of the community towards bacteria with thin cell walls (gram-negative) that are competent in utilizing less favored food sources.

The only way to influence the composition of a microbial community is to change their environment. Adding viable cells (e.g. probiotics) of any particular species would not have any effect on the gut flora. If the environment were favorable to the species added, it would have already been dominant, otherwise, the comparatively small number of live cells surviving transport to the gut would be quickly out-competed by adapted cells.

Hi Louisa. As Melissa said, our ancestors ate dirt. If you don't want to eat dirt, I think probiotics are a good idea. Here's a previous thread on probiotics with several suggestions: http://paleohacks.com/questions/301/probiotic-supplements

Another possibility is that they ate the guts of the animals they killed for food.