Cows Farting? Feed Them Seaweed

Combined YCMTSU and The Health and Science Segments.

Hey folks,

This is just to funny to pass up. You know how the Envionuts and the Chicken Little Crowd has determined the CO2 is now a pollutant that is helping to destroy the planet? Then we have various studies that say a Cow Farting causes more CO2 to be released into the Atmosphere than hundreds of cars? Well, now they think they may have a solution. Seaweed.

According to the AFP - Australia 'reef and beef' project launced I think they mean Launched

SYDNEY (AFP) – An Australian scientist Friday launched what he called a "reef and beef" study into whether feeding cows seaweed would reduce their flatulent carbon emissions, in a move that could help save the Great Barrier Reef.

So Cows farting is now going to destroy the Great Barrier Reef?

Tony Parker, from James Cook University, said cattle produced up to 20 percent of global man-made methane emissions, and the problem was largely linked to their diet.

How in the blue hell is cows farting MAN-MADE?

At least 50 percent of these cows lived in developing nations, many of which were in the tropics, where the quality of pasture tended to deteriorate in the winter, increasing emissions, Parker said.

"Seaweed, algae and other sea grasses have been proven to be much more digestible than land grass because they have less cellulose and more starch," added Parker's research partner Rocky de Nys.

"A better diet for cattle, then, will encourage better digestion and thus lead to a decrease in methane emissions."

So forget the Cattle keeping the fields clean, the Farmers that farm Hay from making a living and HOW MUCH will WHO make in harvesting the Seaweed, shipping it, and selling it to Cow Farmers? Or whatever you call the people who raise Cows.

Methane gas from livestock accounts for about 12 percent of Australia's annual greenhouse emissions, with flatulence from 120 million sheep, cows and goats comprising its third-largest source of damaging gases.

SAYS WHO? How did they come to such a decisive figure?

The average beef cow expels the equivalent of around 1,500 kilograms (3,300 pounds) of carbon per year.

AGAIN?

The scientists said that using seaweed as cattle fodder could also have wider benefits for the environment, by providing coastal farmers with a way to clean waterways that flowed into the Great Barrier Reef.

Uh, they could not clean them before? I know many people who actually EAT Seaweed themselves. I guess that will be one less Carbon Credit that they have to buy for themselves.

Seaweed could be used to clear nitrogen and phosphorous from farming water, but few farmers adopted the method because they were left with "a huge biomass that they don't know what to do with," De Nys said.

He said those nutrients were partly responsible for the breakdown of aquatic ecosystems within the iconic Barrier Reef, which authorities warned this week faced significant threats from climate change and farming runoff.

"I like to call it the 'reef and beef' project because it has far reaching implications that come full circle: starting with seaweed, taking in the beef and aquaculture industries, and extending back out to the sea to help conserve the Great Barrier Reef," added Parker.

Australia's centre-left government has committed to reducing emissions by at least five percent of 2000 levels by 2020, including the introduction by 2011 of a carbon trading scheme.

{Laughing} SCHEME is right.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has committed to deeper cuts of up to 25 percent if world leaders agree on an "ambitious" reduction plan at Copenhagen in December.

So there you go folks. If your Cow is farting to much, just feed it Seaweed. I can see Al Gore talking to people right now, "How can I get in on that? We'll call it 'Off Sets Of The Sea.'"
Peter

Sources:
AFP - Australia 'reef and beef' project launced