[cuz_it_aint_their_money]

The early Survivors actually had a survival element to them. Not so these days. I think some of the first folks came pretty damn close to suffering some permanent physical damage, so there are a lot more ops for food these days.

I think is was a combination of seasons 1 and 2.
Season 1 had the players catching and eating rats, which resulted in a lot of grief from animal rights wackos.
Season 2 had the players risking their own safety to retrieve a can of rice that had washed away in a storm.
From Season 3 on, the producers started giving them more and more food, both at the start of the game and as "rewards".

[SoothingDave]

The Africa season the contestants were starving. Poor Elisabeth Filarski’s (Hasselbeck) hair was starting to fall out. That’s when they pulled back and started feeding them more.

[Right Cal Gal]

Also for Africa, they couldn’t leave the Bomas pretty much so any kind of hunting and fishing was out. All in all, except for the complete smackdown of those rude, a$$hat kids (dubbed “Playskool” by the fan boards), forcing Burnette to initiate the “switch” element, the only bright spot for me was Tom dancing around the beach in the SOS challenge with a feather stuck down his pants.