A good 'un

[grassfarmer]

Nice try Klause but your conclusion is wrong. Research in the northern Plains proved over 7 tons per acre/per year of CO2 could be captured with good pasture management. This was proven over a 5 year trial.

Methane emissions are generally reckoned to be equivalent to 2.5tons a year of C02.

Most cattle operations in this part of the world use 4-5 acres per year per cow so we can sequester about 12 times as much as each cow produces.

[TOM4CWB]

Grassy,

Do you drive vehicles that have the minimum pollution and C02 footprint possible?

I just leased a 2015 Golf TDI wagon for my parts vehicle. Using about 5L/100km diesel with minuscule Urea consumption. Does not use/burn oil between changes. I leave the pickup parked when ever it is possible to use a smaller parts wagon.

Have you done everything possible on your farm... or could I see the black smoke rising from your equipment from far away... as was the norm 15-20 years ago?

[freewheat]

Tom! I drive an Accord for parts. CHEAP. EFFICIENT. Get strange looks though when I pull up beside a one ton with a guy in it picking up a few guards and bolts. You should see what I can fit in that thing! lol.

[grassfarmer]

Tom, I was driving little diesel cars in the early 80s - 1.1 or 1.2 litre. Driving a Corolla currently which we use unless we need to be using a truck.
Not everyone grew up with the fossil fuel wastage of North Americans.
Making new cars has quite a carbon footprint too.

[Klause]

My wife wrote her thesis at the U of S on livestock, carbon sequestration, and methane emissions.


My post was tongue - in -cheek.... notice the wink faces.




All said and done livestock sequester 0.8 tonnes per year more than grain production however is 5% less efficient in a tonne per calorie comparison.


In other words, a toss up. South America I think the advantage was upwards of 6 tonnes per ha towards cattle.


Having to make feed and winter cattle really cuts into it the efficiency up here in na.

[blackpowder]

If my main driver were worth <6000$ and burnt 18 mpg. Why spend 25k to burn 50?

This site gets silly.

[grassfarmer]

Those are "mainstream commodity livestock" figures Klause, those of us practicing alternate ways of managing grass and grazing are getting results towards the S American figures. Feedlots and the grain feeding model leave a big carbon footprint.
We can't banish winter but we can have animals grazing forages for all but 100-120 days versus the 220 feeding day winters commonly practiced on the prairies using fossil fuel grown and harvested feed

[Klause]

Grassy... that may be true... but! And here's a big BUT.

these are averages. Remember my wife is from the Cabri area... they feed hay for jan and Feb... maybe a few days in Dec and march.


Raising cattle in the north interlake is a lot more carbon intensive than southern sk/alberta.


Plus you still have to truck your cattle then truck the beef. That's considering you are calf to finish which few are.


Again meat protein is less dense (compare a cattle liner vs a superB of lentils for instance).

I recall when we were mixed... on a liters/acre basis it took twice as much fuel to cut bale and haul hay than it did to seed spray and harvest.


Yes combines and big 4wds burn around 100 an hr but look at what they get done in that hour vs. How much hay you cut, bale and haul in an hour.


At the same time, and this was the premise of her thesis... a balance is required. Poor land can raise an awful lot of meat protein cheaply and with little environmental impact vs. Trying to grow poor crops on it.


At the same time on highly productive soil meat protein is far less efficient than grwin protein on a cal/acre basis.


Basically... what I'm getting at is we need both and the sooner cattle and grain guys can figure out how to work together instead of gnattering back and forth the sooner we can both make more money.

[grassfarmer]

My point was not so much about fuel usage but about sequestration using grazing management - things like high density mob grazing give the opportunity to sequester so much more than conventional "turn them out on the range till fall" management.
New knowledge, new methods are catching on among some beef producers - as revolutionary as no-till was for farmers.

[cottonpicken]

Look out your window. How many years worth of co2 is in the air right now from the fires.

[grassfarmer]

Smoke from forest fires is nothing new, likely less now than pre settlement of the prairies as no-one was fighting fires then.
Not the cause of the increasing temperatures on earth and not an excuse not to tackle the real causes.

[tweety]

Grassfarmer, how are you replacing the nutrients taken from your grassland that is being grazed?