victor809 wrote:Hehehe....
Environmental impact of eating meat has been a big thing here on the west.... it's an attempt by vegetarian groups to make it more popular. Essentially what it comes down to is the amount of water and land necessary to raise cows has a pretty bad environmental impact. They aren't wrong.... but it's irrelevant as long as people keep breeding like they do. So I'm not gonna forgo my desert on the titanic.
Lets talk environmental impact - I will concentrate on grazing animals and not protein factories.
Yes cows on the same flat piece of farmland produces less nutrition per acre than crops. And of course there are impacts of cattle on the land, different, but not necessarily less than crops.
There are huge areas of this country that should not be farmed for grain or vegetables. These same areas can support cattle and produce food.
Cattle can graze on land that would otherwise require irrigation. Cattle can graze on native range, not requiring fertilizer and pesticide application.
In some areas crops are rotated with pasture in order to allow land to rest and to avoid buildup of crop pathogens in the soil. It is not always a good idea to keep intensively cropping the same land. Cattle allow an alternative revenue for the land.
Cattle can graze up the side of steep hills that are not reasonably farmable. And if you tried to farm these areas, you likely create erosion and sedimentation in creeks and waterways.
Pasture areas or native rangeland with low density of cattle can support other wildlife not welcome in cultivated farms.
Areas with naturally poor soils are ideal for grazing whereas to farm them you would need to expend extra cost and energy to make them productive.
The increased mechanization of farming using bigger and bigger tractors results in more odd shaped areas that are not practical to crop. Mainly because small areas between gullies or other natural features can not be reached by equipment. Cows dont have that problem.
