Vegetarian Diets More Harmful to Environment

[LollyD]

This study must have been funded by the meat industry. It just doesn't make sense to this vegetarian. My pecan trees give us a lot of food, put lots of oxygen into the air and don't need much water....

[ChicagoGranny]

This study must have been funded by the meat industry. It just doesn't make sense to this vegetarian. My pecan trees give us a lot of food, put lots of oxygen into the air and don't need much water....

Did you read the article? The study was done by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University. Please don't tell me they are shills for Big Meat.

Think about lettuce - very few calories, requires lots of land and water.

What portion of the vegetarian diet do pecans make?

This country is not fed by backyard gardens and backyard fruit and nut trees.

[chunkyfrog]

In order to produce commercial pecans, bees are transported hundreds of miles.
This practice has not yet been absolved of any connection from colony collapse disorder.
No bees, no food, we all die . . .

[ChicagoGranny]

Nobody around here is wasting water,

I constantly hear that the water crisis in California is largely man-made with drought being an aggravating factor.

A quick internet search yielded this article - http://www.thenewamerican.com/tech/envi ... california

It does seem that better politics could achieve much better water resource management.

Maybe you are familiar with that article and will comment.

[Goofproof]

This study must have been funded by the meat industry. It just doesn't make sense to this vegetarian. My pecan trees give us a lot of food, put lots of oxygen into the air and don't need much water....

Did you read the article? The study was done by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University. Please don't tell me they are shills for Big Meat.

Think about lettuce - very few calories, requires lots of land and water.

What portion of the vegetarian diet do pecans make?

This country is not fed by backyard gardens and backyard fruit and nut trees.

Don't discount squirrels like nuts, and many vegetarians are squirrely. Jim

[PoolQ]

I stopped read that article at "I know that our water crisis is not an unfortunate natural occurrence; it is the intended result of a long-term campaign waged by radical environmentalists who resorted to political pressure as well as profuse lawsuits"

You see he represents farmers, which are very important, but if they get all the water they want then all the fish in the rivers die (some are being reintroduced because the river had already died out), a balance must be reached. We have some farmers that have long standing water rights and they really can (and some do) take all they want. We also have some rich people that use all they want, the worst is someone in SoCal that is using $90,000 of water a month or a year, can't remember which but either is too much.

I live near San Francisco bay and our land is actually sinking, as is the central valley, because of all the water being pumped out. How do you sink a state, well we are doing it and still talking about if we use too much water.

[ChicagoGranny]

Here is an article about hypocritical voters destroying the egg industry in CA - http://modernfarmer.com/2013/06/voting- ... g-another/

[sleepylynn]

Here is an article about hypocritical voters destroying the egg industry in CA - http://modernfarmer.com/2013/06/voting- ... g-another/

In the grocery store, "humanely raised" is a meaningless term. Yes, I suppose "cage free" or "free-range" is better than battery farming, but not by much. Chickens granted either of these designations are still generally overcrowded, and while people may have an image of them roaming a grassy field or something, the truth is that they're crammed into large dirt-floor buildings with maybe a couple of feet of outdoor space along the sides. Beaks are often clipped because the birds will peck the crap out of each other in such crowded conditions.

Many people don't know how battery hens are kept, either. I worked on a commercial chicken farm for all of a week before I couldn't stand it anymore and had to bail. The cages were 18 inches tall, wide, and deep, and held SEVEN full-grown hens apiece. Every hen is generally bald and rubbed raw from having her cage mates stepping all over her for the entirety of her life.

If people truly want humanely raised chickens, they'd better find a local farmer who lets their birds roam during the day. Otherwise, as I've said, that humane designation is largely meaningless.

[Goofproof]

I am against animal cruelty also, but vegetables don't have it easy either. Yesterday I was at the store, buying cabbage for my vegetable soup, I looked at them all, they had been raised in conditions so crowded, the hair had been rubbed off each head. Jim

[sleepylynn]

I am against animal cruelty also, but vegetables don't have it easy either. Yesterday I was at the store, buying cabbage for my vegetable soup, I looked at them all, they had been raised in conditions so crowded, the hair had been rubbed off each head. Jim

Not to mention the fact that all the cabbages have to have their heads chopped off so you can have your soup! Oh the humanity!

[Heart Jumping]

This study must have been funded by the meat industry. It just doesn't make sense to this vegetarian. My pecan trees give us a lot of food, put lots of oxygen into the air and don't need much water....

Did you read the article? The study was done by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University. Please don't tell me they are shills for Big Meat.

I agree with you, it's a legit source and no reason to believe it's funded by "big meat". BUT, the media is infamous for taking science studies out of context to grab the big headline and sadly some scientists will even take advantage of that. We see that in this instance with the lettuce versus bacon comparison:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... acon-does/
Heller said the Carnegie Mellon paper did a good job of estimating Americans' daily caloric intake and expanded on his work by quantifying the energy and water impacts of different foods.

But on the bacon-versus-lettuce greenhouse gas emissions showdown, Heller called the comparison "ridiculous."

"We don't eat lettuce for its calories," he said, adding that is why in his food analyses he prefers to do assessments of full diets rather than food-by-food caloric comparisons.

"It's much easier to compare diets that are different but provide a similar level of nutrition," he said.

[jilliansue]

"Eating lettuce is over three times worse in greenhouse gas emissions than eating bacon," said Paul Fischbeck, professor of social and decisions sciences and engineering and public policy. "Lots of common vegetables require more resources per calorie than you would think. Eggplant, celery and cucumbers look particularly bad when compared to pork or chicken."

I think the "resources per calorie" is significant here and potentially misleading. Certainly animal products are more calorie dense. A high number of calories would appear to be part of our obesity problem in this country.

[Heart Jumping]

I think the "resources per calorie" is significant here and potentially misleading. Certainly animal products are more calorie dense. A high number of calories would appear to be part of our obesity problem in this country.

A
An argument could also be made that in this instance, it's actually OK not to compare calories to calories. Meaning, that it's likely that on average vegetarians are thinner and consume fewer calories than meat eaters. So if we're really going to make the comparison, we'd have to determine average calories consumed across meat eaters, versus average calories consumed across vegetarians.

Granted, all meat eaters aren't the same any more than all vegetarians are, and it's possible to follow a low calorie meat diet, but if we're talking gross averages and environmental impact, then as part of that comparison you'd want the analyses to be based on how many calories on average each consumes.

[chunkyfrog]

When I was a kid, my brother and I had to go into the windbreak at sundown
to herd the chickens into the coop. If they roosted in the trees, the weasels would kill them.
We always lost a few hens to predators.

[kaiasgram]

"Eating lettuce is over three times worse in greenhouse gas emissions than eating bacon," said Paul Fischbeck, professor of social and decisions sciences and engineering and public policy. "Lots of common vegetables require more resources per calorie than you would think. Eggplant, celery and cucumbers look particularly bad when compared to pork or chicken."

I think the "resources per calorie" is significant here and potentially misleading. Certainly animal products are more calorie dense. A high number of calories would appear to be part of our obesity problem in this country.

It's so interesting how the media presents research findings to the public. The authors themselves acknowledge, "There's a complex relationship between diet and the environment." Ultimately the picture is so much bigger than any one study can take into account.

BTW, did anyone else notice this article in smaller print alongside the headliner article?