[Old Shep]

Most of us on TAS are well-rehearsed in the arguments for extensive, pasture-fed meat and dairy, and as frustrated as I am that there seems to be no realistic recipe for sustainable veganism in the UK - but that doesn't stop the spread of it.

What are the arguments for pasture fed meat and dairy?
How will grassland save the world?

I am not a vegan although recently i have started reducing meat levels to feel like i am doing something for the environment and i tried the vegan KFC burger and thought it was great. I have been raising my own meat for a few years now and would love to raise all my own meat but that's not an option for me because i do not have much space.

It's very simple actually - when the grass grows 10 inches tall the roots also grow around 10 inches. When the cow eats 7 inches from the top - 7 inches of the roots will die of and stay in the soil as carbon - fixed from the atmosphere. Your cow will then poo on the grass this fertilizing the soil even more with mass of nutrients and nitrogen.
When you plough a field to grow maize for silage you realise a massive amount of nitrogen and carbon from soil into the atmosphere. You use a lot of fossil fuel, water, artificial fertilizers etc. And cows could do all the job for you and still FIX the carbon and nitrogen instead if realising it.

Plus, as I've mentioned elsewhere, it's not just trees that lock up carbon, other vegetation systems do exactly the same.  Permanent pastureland, floes, taiga, scrubland, peat bogs, veldt, the grasslands of Africa, all these store Carbon to the same extent as trees.  The bandwagon to replace all these with endless trees is a dangerous move.  We need to understand the whole of the science, the ecology, then be selective of where we plant our trees, and where we grow our crops, and where we leave well alone.

In fact grassland stores carbon much faster than trees - grass grows much more dry mass per year per acre than forest. We just see 100 year old forest and see lots of carbon stored in branches etc. Its not as obvious with grass - but as I said the life of grass happens much faster than oak.

I absolutely agree with the benefits of grassland.  I love trees too but grassland is amazing IF grazed correctly. Alan Savory has some very informative videos on youtube about reverting desertified areas back to green.


I respect everyone's decision to eat what they chose as long as they respect mine.  Veganism and vegetarianism rely on a lot of arable farming. (Yes intensive livestock farming may do too and we need to go back to more pasture fed).  In order for the land to sequester carbon it needs green plant cover. What percentage of the year is your average arable field green? Bare soil or yellow crops dont do it.  So how about we stop producing so many cereal crops for animal and human use and turn the arable fields back to pasture fed livestock grazing? We could all then go on the Atkins diet to save the planet!!

[Steph Hen]

Grassland can be sustainable, as in goes on forever. Arable cropping of cereals is bad, but industrial vegetable growing is horrendous for the soil.  They can be grown allotment scale fine, and I'm aware of the first crops of no dig potatoes which is exciting.

What we need is permanent crops, all the berries, nuts and fruits, asparagus, and artichokes, and herbs and stuff that's been listed on here before.
Small scale vegetable production, without heavy inputs and machines (lots of people picking and tending all this stuff -don't worry, it'll be robots before you know it).
Grassland managed well, with robust animals that don't need much housing or extra food (there's always going to be a bit of 2nd rate veg they could have, but not endless pellets.)
Sounds like pales diet doesn't it! Sounds pretty healthy to me and probably sustainable, if we'd all accept less consumption on all levels, I still think it would work. I think we'd be eating meat once or twice a week making broths or whatever from leftovers. Eggs too, but from hens scratching over compost rather than pellets of grains and soya.

[Old Shep]

Sounds like a good plan!


Also one of the first things everyone can do to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and also plastic usage is to stop wasting food.  It's criminal how much is chucked into kitchen bins. All you need to do is plan your meals and shop accordingly surely?


Sorry going a bit off topic....

[GBov]

My favorite cousin has a vegan deli and is, in my opinion at least, totally insane on the issue.  Some of her friends though are downright scary and would not hesitate to "save" animals by returning them to the wild.

Like mink.  Yeh, we all know how well that went, don't we?

Slight aside, why is it ok for a fox to kill a rabbit and not for me to do it?  Or to be ok drive a car that kills any animal of any sex or age that it hits but not for me to kill a chicken or for me to even have a chicken?

Why should all domestic animals be killed off in a bloody wave of veganism but not a few at a time for people to eat?  Shelters until they die of old age?  Seriously?

The single largest problem I personally have with veganism is that the diet seems to be almost totally based upon soy and yet no one even seems to notice or care.  Millions upon millions of acres of soy monoculture marinated in toxic chemicals - pesticides, herbicides, chemical fertilizers, fungicides - and then, about three or four weeks before the crop would ripen naturally it is hit with a huge amount of roundup weed killer because, as the plant is dying it ripens its seeds in a desperate attempt to produce the next generation.

Thus the crop is ready for harvest sooner. 

Keep in mind as well that almost 92% of the world's soy crop is GMO and designed to be resistant to glyphosate (roundup) damage so the final spray is much stronger for a roundup ready crop than for any other.

Agrichemicals are known to cause too many problems even to fit into this space.

Now, when an industry has LOTS of something it is easier to find new markets for their existing product than to get a new product to market so soy is now being pushed everywhere and it is totally bad for you.  Like, awesomely bad. The research is there for those who look - the Weston A Price Foundation has lots of good info but people are being sold on its being good for you and a perfect alternative to eating meat.

The new push to veganism is being fueled not by vegans but by a huge multinational industry based upon soy.  The same industry that is supplying feedlots with soy-based livestock feed and also shipping soy-based livestock feed to the UK to mess up livestock keeping here too. 

What farmer has the luxury of not feeding something cheap to their herd that will increase milk production or fatten livestock faster?  Farmers are on such tiny margins that even a small increase in a herds/flocks output means a huge difference in the families' quality of life.  The fact that soy makes rubbish milk, or indeed meat, is beside the point.  It makes MORE of it, faster.

Then toss into the mix ships and shipping and cutting down forests and plowing up more land to grow, you guessed it, more soy and you have a perfect storm.

The UK is totally capable of raising enough food to feed its own population, including its domestic animals and pets but that costs money and requires the infrastructure to do it and the understanding of why it should be done which I can't see happening. 

Remember, the reason animals were domesticated in the first place is because animals eat what humans can not and turn it into something people can eat and use.

That fact is as relevant today as it was 2,000 years ago so I will say it again.  Animals were domesticated to eat what we can't and turn it into food and materials we can.

What crop can you grow on rocky cold poor ground?  Not veg, not grain, not soy - meat!  You can raise meat on it and sequester carbon at the same time.  Win win.

When people tell me that they are vegan and produce all their own food is the day I will respect the movement but until then, with a diet based upon monoculture and imported foods, vegan is not better for the planet or our species.

Sadly though the problem is not vegans v omnivores because I think we could work it out between us, it is all about money and power.

Money and Power.

Root of all evil those two, eh?

[SallyintNorth]

You have expressed all of my concerns very eloquently, GBov

[Polyanya]

Late again to this post and I agree very much with the points mentioned - I'm only repeating what a lot of folk have said in that there are many kinds of vegans some are very extreme, but surely they are a minority like a lot of extremists and they give the rest a bed name. I do know quite a few vegans who admire my ethos to rearing my own domesticated animals as naturally as possible, with good happy well fed lives and understanding deaths - I think its the intensive, artificial, large scale commercial farming that a lot of vegans abhor (so do I). 

[SallyintNorth]

Yes, as with everything, it's the extremists who ram everything down your throat and respect no-one else's point of view who are the problem.

We've had people who call themselves vegan come here as visitors, and one even came here to live, who have been happy to eat meat we've raised here because they can see that our animals are treated with enormous respect and care.

But I guess in those cases, veganism is a dietary choice rather than a political stance. 

[Herbs,Hens and Spaniels]

I think its the intensive, artificial, large scale commercial farming that a lot of vegans abhor (so do I). 

Me too!  That's the thing isn't it?- Nothing is black or white. There are so many different farming models and livestock farming can be factory scale or a pasture raised, extensive system. Equally fruit and vegetable production can be just as intensive, artificial, large scale and commercial! And does intensive always mean bad? If a Smallholding followed John Seymours  plan for self sufficiency on 5 acres, so say half an acre each of different crops,  fruit and veg, small coppice and perhaps grazing for possibly sheep or hay for a couple of milk goats,( completely hypothetical). Oh and produced organically!

Thats what the likes of Colin Tudge call good intensive.
Also, plenty of room for native breeds and conserving rare breeds in the argument for sustainable food production too, do you think?

[Steph Hen]

 I like the extreme ones, they go to huge lengths to modify their lives and work really hard to try to make things better (in their view). It's the wishy washy hypocrisy I don't like. Animals should be able to exit it their five freedoms, but it's ok to have cats that never get out of a flat, fish in tanks, birds in cages, and all these animals spade and castrated so they never experience sexual drive nor motherhood. With horns and balls and tails cut off.
 It works for us to say it's ok or best for the animals, but it isn't hard to imagine a world that would work better for animals, or where they could exhibit more natural behaviours.
I'm not saying we should ban all these things, pets and livestock farming, but that I think there are some sound arguments for addressing the exploitation of animals and considering other angles of welfare, etc.

[SallyintNorth]

I'm not saying we should ban all these things, pets and livestock farming, but that I think there are some sound arguments for addressing the exploitation of animals and considering other angles of welfare, etc.

I don't think anyone here would disagree with that last

[Polyanya]

Wow I so resonate with all the opinions on here - I wish you all lived near me 

[messyhoose]

there seems to be as much ignorane on the omnivore front as the extremist vegab front, judging by the, frankly unoriginal, statements of late.
allow me as a diplomatic and open minded vegan to explain all the points you claim to be the ones that you find hardest to understand.
so GBov- please tell me if i can help with anything else:
1) mink. firstly Man introduced a non native species to the uk to exploit for its fur. they were kept singly in barren cages- not a life at all worth living. True releasing them into the wild was not ok. Fact- many escaped of their own accord anyway. Also fact- many animal welfare & rights groups are anti the actions of those that released these animals- acknowledging the devastating consequences to native wildlife and also at the actual ability of the non-native to survive (as with the coypu in Norfolk also). Fur farming should be banned and i dont think many folk would feel a loss to the countryside if this form of animal exploitation were stopped overnight.
2) there is no difference at all to the fox hunting and eating a rabbit, to a lion hunting and eating a deer, from you hunting and eating your kill. BUT- how many consumers actually do go and get their own meat- from killing it and doing all the things necessary to eat it? And not just because they dont live in the countryside but because a huge number of meat eaters do not want to accept the death part of the food production. If anyone is a hypocrit it is not the vegan with best intentions but it is the meat eater who wont kill an animal themselves!
3) i have already explained how a vegan society would come about- animals would NOT be killed off in a a bloody wave- animals currently alive would be sheltered and NO MORE BREEDING would then bring about the end of livestock farming over a fairly long period of time, possibly decades. I really hate repeating myself.
4)actually i do not eat or drink soy (maybe for us vegans 30 years ago it was all about the soy- and you can blame the italian mafia for that- they destroyed the development of bacterial protein back in the day to protect their business interests- dont blame the consumer. A lot of vegans are also well informed environmentalists and boycott not only soy but anything with palm oil in (which a lot of commercial vegan processed foods also contain). Processed food in general are never all that great are they? We are very aware of what is in our food, and its provenance- but it is not that tricky, or a restrictive diet to be able to buy ethical and environmentally soundly. And on a budget (i aint made of money!!)
5) talking about ships and shipping never forget the business of shipping live animals to foreign lands (not policed by our laws) for slaughter- not only from uk but from NZ and Oz and others- 15,000 sheep drowned when a ship sank in Romania only recently. But thats ok i suppose- they were only going to be killed anyways- right?! : If the UK can feed its own why is the export of live animals still continuing? It is true- money and power!
6) I strongly dispute the statement that domestication of animals came about to utilise foodstuffs we can not. NO! Carnivores (ate the same as us and hunted it with us) were our security and companions, Man domesticated the few herbivores it did because it meant a more reliable meal- rather than going out searching for that animal and (like the rest of the meat eating animal kingdom) only have a 50% success rate of getting a meal (im a zoologist i can explain these figures if you want) why not corral them and have a 100% success rate of catching and eating them? Simples. And not all herbivores were domesticated cos their natural behaviour was not adaptable to meet humans confinement requirements.
7) likewise when meat eaters tell me they have produced all their own food i will respect their movement. Touche.

And Steph Hen, everything you said i agree with except the neutering thing- the reason why neutering is necessary is cos Man does not deal with the fallout. We are already suffering from the over population of cats and dogs due to breeding - with the resultant litters being neglected or dumped at animal shelters- again ive said this before- shelters are full to the rafters with unwanted dogs and cats- does that demonstrate a society that should be allowed to exploit animals without consequence? Tells me vegans arguement against having pets may have a point. There may be extremist vegans but there are plenty of animal abusing/ neglecting humans too sadly. So in the face of a society with pet animals i wholeheartedly condone sterilisation (you can not claim that a domestic animal has in any way shape or form a normal life in order to then prioritise the "normal  behaviour" of procreation. I went the to HSA AGM many years ago and asked if a local anaestetic for lay farmers might ever be available for farmers to castrate lambs humanely. I am anti tail docking. They said no- that the pain caused was short lived and the number of sheep castrated annually made it unlikely a farmer would afford such a luxury- they suggested farmers alter their management methods in order to make castration unnecessary as a way to avoid having to do it, if they were against it. At that same meeting a very voiciferous group argued against the culling of day old male chicks via the mincer method. They were shot down, saying the killing took milliseconds and the chicks would be unaware. However over a decade later now many egg producing companies have researched ways to sex the eggs so that soon no male chicks will ever be born in this industry and so male chick mincing will be obsolete Progress.

[GBov]

Numbers 2 and 7?  Me! 

And why should animals be held until they die of old age without doing what all life strives to do, reproduce?

[Steph Hen]

I was meaning it more as a train of thought rather than thinking it would be ideal to ban neutering.  I simply think there is an interesting debate regarding elective surgery for millions of animals where the 'extreme' vegan argument is 'stop keeping and exploiting animals' which removes the need.

[messyhoose]

GBov- the bigger question is why should animals be held til they die of old age period. We invented domestic animals- they are not natural phenomenon. The world will still have wild animals when all the domestic ones die of old age and are not replaced due to continued breeding (which is "allowed" by Man by the way- you dont give the animals the right to choose who they mate with (and when) do you?- so you have removed any natural part of the process (mate selection, survival of the fittest) anyways. I have ccampaigned against factory farming which totally removes all the animals ability to function the way it was born to, and am happy to endorse farms that seek to improve the quality of life of their animals by observing (as a minimum obligation) the 5 freedoms. As i have already said before i respect anyone who does kill and eat their own, as they are not hypocrits- Of course this is a smallholding forum- i know most of you on here grow and raising your own food!!!!