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Freaky.
Visible nipples!!! This one is going to go.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gruff
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Originally Posted by Witis
Do you feel any duty of care towards cattle to prevent their mistreatment? E.g. if they are underfed, refused vet treatment, beaten black and blue, or otherwise tortured or harassed especially prior to being killed?Quote:
Originally Posted by FunkyDexter
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Originally Posted by Witis
Didn't you say they were a blight on the landscape? Perhaps you'll have to explain it to me Sharky as I interpreted that to mean that you view them as an eyesore, a blight on the landscape, something to be killed because they are ugly.Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
Heh, a corpulent president, like a bear that needs to hibernate for a couple of years. Obviously that is not the weight range I was focusing on in my analysis, I was focusing on the optimal body weight range for a particular height rather than trying to encourage folks to get so fat that they die prematurely of a heart attack. :LQuote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
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Originally Posted by Witis
Are you saying that cows should be grateful to the humans that farm them for food; recalling that:Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
- Beef cattle are killed after only 14-20 months even though the can live for >25 years.
- Dairy cattle are killed after 4 lactations (milk producing periods) meaning that few live beyond 7 years.
- Veal calves are killed after only a few days or months e.g. "Bob veal, from calves that are slaughtered when only a few days old (at most 1 month old) up to 60 lb" - Wiki.
Did you end all black and blue?Quote:
Originally Posted by szlamany
What's your favourite fly dish Peter?Quote:
Originally Posted by dday9
Cows are responsible for more greenhouse gases than motor cars. By eating as many as I can I'm doing my bit for the enviroment.
Also, they're basically just a concentrated form of grass so by eating them I'm engaging in a militant form of vegetarianism.
Ah, I see why you are confused Bambi. You interpreted that as "how they look on the landscape" whereas I meant "how the landscape looks after cows have been there.". Cows destroy a considerable amount of habitat in dry areas like this. Vigorous efforts are needed to keep them out of streams and other water bodies, or else they destroy the banks, increase erosion, kill fish (in several different ways), and so on. When they aren't in the streams, their grazing can make it easier for invasive species to move in, and destroy cover/habitat for lots of native species. Part of this has to do with the number of cows in an area, other parts barely matter as long as there are cows.Quote:
Originally Posted by Witis
Any individual cow will certainly not be grateful, just as any organism killed by some other organism (whether a bacteria, velociraptor, human, or moose) would not be grateful. However, if you believe in the concept of the selfish gene, where the real purpose of evolution is to increase the proliferation of some set of genes, then the strategy that cows have adopted has been a terrific success. Both cows and mammoths appear to have been tasty (though we don't really know about mammoths), but mammoths are extinct, while cows have been spread all over the world and exist in great numbers. They certainly wouldn't suvive very well without humans, either, especially the modern dairy cow, which has been altered so greatly to increase milk production. So, what we have is a strange form of symbiosis at the species level.Quote:
Originally Posted by Witis
I didn't look too far into it but initially it seems that statement is wrong. I have read calculations that show that a standard car driven 12'500 km per year (7'800 miles per year) produces about the same greenhouse gas emissions as a cow in a year. What does seem to be true is that the entire livestock sector, not just cattle, produces more greenhouse gas emissions than the transport sector.Quote:
Originally Posted by FunkyDexter
The problem with that logic is that the number of livestock have grown to help an ever growing number of humans on the planet meaning that the problem will continue to worsen as the number of humans climbs over the next 30 years especially as the livestock also need more land and that means clearing more forests further impacting on the greenhouse gas levels. The only way to remedy the situation is to reduce the number of humans until it reaches a sustainable level that does not stress the planet's resources. In turn the number of livestock will fall substantially. Then humans should also turn to renewable non polluting sources of energy and they are just about in for the win. F.T.W. You can't blame the cows for a problem generated by irresponsible and selfish humans breeding too much.Quote:
Originally Posted by FunkyDexter
I would have thought that you would view yourself as more carnivore than herbivore, but if you want to be viewed as a militant herbivore I won't stop you Herbie. Also you seem to have missed my question above so here it is once again: "Do you feel any duty of care towards cattle to prevent their mistreatment? E.g. if they are underfed, refused vet treatment, beaten black and blue, or otherwise tortured or harassed especially prior to being killed?"Quote:
Originally Posted by FunkyDexter
Yeah, I can see how that critique may apply in the case of some species of animal that root around and tear up the ground like wild boars, but cows, really? I can only envision them gently grazing on grass and only causing any problem in areas where the soil cannot support their weight, and they probably wouldn't be too happy staying in conditions hazardous to their balance anyway and would naturally prefer to move to firmer pastures. Also how does their grazing kill fish and make it easier for invasive species to move in?Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
No, you are right, it is very sad. :cry:Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
The problem is that it is not symbiosis, as soon as you include killing beef for food especially after only a short period of time relative to the lifespan of the animal, it is a parasitic/parasitoidal rather than symbiotic relationship. Symbosis meaning "living together" in a mutually beneficial manner rather than one benefiting at the other's expense (parasitism). Thus the cows have only grown in numbers as the host of a murderous parasite. I don't imagine that there are too many humans that would ever desire to become cows or would define the growth in the number of cattle a success; it is a sad loss for the species due to their massively reduced lifespan, their loss of freedom, and the often the poor conditions that they are forced to endure relative to their life in the wild. If cows were only used for milk and vet science was ubiquitously used to extend their lives to say 40+ years of age then perhaps you could call their proliferation a success.Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
For the individual, you are right. Therefore, the typical definition of symbiosis doesn't apply. However, at the population level it does. Our spread has been assisted by cows, and the spred of cows is entirely dependent on us.
If your image of cows is a nice green field, picture cows in a desert, as that's what we have. You can't have all that many cows per square KM, because there isn't all that much forage, but there is enough to sustain cows. The soil is fairly fragile, as a single car track across a desert can take decades to fade away (the wagon tracks from the Oregon Trail are still visible where development hasn't wiped them out). So, the hoofprints of cattle will remain for years. Their pies last at least a year, and probably a couple years, too, but they dry out thoroughly, and can probably be used as firewood (it is used in some places).Quote:
Originally Posted by Witis
Streams in this environment are the major location of water, so along streams are the only places where vegetation grows thick and green year round. Trees only grow along the banks of permanent streams, too. The vegetation shades and cools the water, while the streams form undercut banks. Both the vegetation and the undercut banks provide shade and cover for fish, while keeping the water temperatures cool enough for the fish to survive. Once cows get to the stream, they trample and consume the vegetation on the banks. If that was brief, it would be survivable, but unfenced banks are destroyed in short order. All the vegetation goes away, the banks cave in, the water temperature rises, and sedimentation increases. This suffocates the fish, destroys redds, and heats the water to the point where fish can't live there anymore.
One of the biggest challenges we face are getting ranchers to fence off streams so that cows can't get near them. The fact that salmon and steelhead are endangered has made it more urgent, but also somewhat more possible in areas where those species spawn. Generally, ranchers are pretty supportive once they see how much nicer the streams become once fenced, and we've gotten lots of them on board. It's not all that cheap to build cow-proof fences, though, so it's hard to get ranchers to do that on their own. They don't often have huge profit margins. Still, there are lots of fenced off areas around water on public lands grazing, and the water that is protected is dramatically better quality than the water that isn't fenced off.
You are right the typical definition of symbiosis doesn't apply because it is a form of parasitism that happens to include the death of the host rather than symbiosis, and I still don't view it as a success for the cows due to all of my aforementioned reasons, and a good check is to ascertain if you could ever be happy or tolerate being changed into a cow. I don't think many would ever be happy being turned into a cow and that reflects very badly on the human race.Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
The spread of humans and the growth in the number of humans to unsustainable levels is not something to be proud of, it really has to be actioned or it is likely to generate all manner of problems for the planet. Everyone, although some quite reluctantly, seems to want to work out how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, yet very few are bringing the much more serious problem of having too many humans on the planet to the fore. How hard is it to say look just keep it in you pants, have a cold shower, read a book, or work on something positive rather than making too many more humans?
Some farmers power their entire milking operations from the methane generated from cow dung.Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
Fish need shade? Not in the ocean. If they do there must be underwater plants and even shade from underwater overhangs that can provide the fish with the relief they need. Also I highly doubt that cows kill the trees along the banks and they probably only eat some of the species of plants that grow by the streams. Also there has always been animal life, even in the desert, and such animals have to drink a certain amount of water every day to survive meaning that river banks always have to endure some degree of animal traffic every day. As a result I still find it difficult to believe that cows are somehow the river bank vandals that you make them out to be. Don't they tend to use the same watering spots/holes to drink from on a regular basis leaving most of the river bank untouched?Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
It's not the cows, I ate all the salmon. =)Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker
Fencing is expensive, an eyesore, and can even put humans off. If the cows aren't getting their water from the streams where do they get a nice cool drink from in the desert?Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker