Posted on 03/21/2021 12:17:51 AM PDT by nickcarraway
Is your adorable puppy as bad for the planet as a gas-guzzling SUV?
While the precise carbon pawprint of our pets is the source of scientific debate, one thing is becoming increasingly clear: lovable, they may be, cats and dogs have an impact on the planet.
In their 2009 book “Time to Eat the Dog?”, Brenda and Robert Vale sparked anger among pet owners for saying that the meat eaten by an average canine companion had twice the carbon footprint as driving an SUV 10,000 kilometres.
A decade on, the verdict is still out on the planetary impact linked to the diets of cats and dogs.
“I’ve got nothing against pets,” said Gregory Okin, a professor at the University of California’s Institute of Environment and Sustainability.
“I know that they bring a lot of good to people, both working animals and companion animals.
“But I believe that for people who want to make informed choices, they should have the information available to them,” he told AFP.
In a 2017 study, Okin estimated that the 160 million domestic cats and dogs in the US were responsible for between 25-30% of the environmental impact of meat consumed in the country.
That’s 64 million tonnes of C02, equivalent to the annual emissions of 13 million petrol or diesel cars.
Kelly Swanson, a professor in animal nutrition at the University of Illinois, disputes the findings of that study, saying the calculations were based on “a lot of inaccurate assumptions”.
“Because most pet foods are based on secondary products from the human food industry, especially the ingredients that are animal-based, the environmental costs of those ingredients are not the same as those being consumed by humans,” he told AFP.
For Sebastien Lefebvre, from Lyon’s VetAgro-Sup veterinary school, carbon emissions from conventional mass-produced animal food was “negligible”.
He said emissions from pet food would only be a concern “when mankind stops food waste (and becomes) completely vegetarian.”
He said that unfashionable cuts of meat, including offal, which many humans turn their noses up at, would be ideal for pet food in order to avoid waste.
Yet in some countries, including the Netherlands, meat is reared specifically for animal consumption.
Geography matters
Pim Martens, professor of sustainable development at Maastricht University, said that – as with humans – animal carbon footprints “depend on where you live in the world”.
In a 2019 study, Martens found the lifetime emissions of a dog weighing 10-20 kilogrammes in the Netherlands was anywhere between 4.2 and 17 tonnes of CO2 equivalent.
For the same dog living in China, emissions were between 3.7-19.1 tonnes. In Japan however, the same dog would be expected to produce 1.5-9.9 tonnes during its life.
Ten tonnes of CO2 are roughly the same as the emissions produced by two cars every year.
But Martens said he doesn’t find that comparison useful.
“Would that mean that if you don’t own a dog or a cat you can drive an SUV or drive more in your car? It doesn’t make any sense.”
But scientists can agree on at least one thing: a large dog, logically, eats more than a small cat and therefore has a bigger environmental impact.
Get a bird instead?
So, what can the environmentally conscious animal lovers out there do to mitigate the damage caused by their furry friends?
Okin suggests considering other species of animals to have as pets, such as hamsters or birds.
“Maybe from the ecological pawprint point of view, everyone should get a lizard or a big spider” instead of a dog, said Martens.
“But if you don’t want to have an ecological pawprint, don’t have a pet at all.”
One solution for animals and the planet would be to cut down or diversify the protein in their diet.
Several dried food producers already use insects in their kibble, although there is still debate over the environmental merits of various animal foods and their production.
Lefebvre said “it’s not impossible, theoretically” to turn your pet dog vegetarian, under supervision from your vet.
But there’s one environmental impact from outdoor cats he said he knows can’t be avoided.
“A massacre all around your home: dead birds, shrews, lizards…”
I live in Phoenix. There are plenty of feral and semi-feral cats in my neighborhood. We do not have much in the way of roof rats. Those neighborhoods that do not have a significant outdoor cat population have plenty of roof rats. I will take the trade-off.
This topic will do more stop the momentum of the Global BS train than just about any other. This puts more than just rural residents in the crosshairs of the Global BS warriors. It should be included in every Global BS conversation.
Dogs don’t prevent plague, either.
Is it something you enjoy?
If so, its probably bad for the environment.
You don’t put up a bird feeder to feed the birds. The birds can do fine on their own. You put them up to attract them so you can enjoy watching them. We had a bird feeder outside our living room window in New Hampshire and we had 2 Hummingbird feeders in Georgia.
The Audobon Society calls cats the biggest threats to birds. Perhaps power lines and windows are numbers 2 and 3?
At any rate, nothing in the world is going to convince cat lovers that their pets are in fact murderous vermin, just like nothing is going to convince bird lovers that cats are the only thing standing between us and world domination by mice. So I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.
Given that there are appr. 3 x 10^12 = 3,000,000 million tonnes of CO2 in the atmosphere, 64 out of 3,000,000 does not cause me any concern.
Audubon denounces bird hunting. I don’t think there’s a bigger source of funds for wildlife than hunter dollars.
Don't worry. I shot two coyotes and a wolf as canine offsets. < /s>
“Eff da Erf”
Feel free to give up meat, a modern lifestyle, and even your pets if you wish Gaia Worshippers. I’m not giving up any of mine. I don’t worship your false god.
Dogs are Haram in Islam.
meat eaten by an average canine companion had twice the carbon footprint as driving an SUV 10,000 kilometres
There's not a whole lot of meat in dog food. Unless you're buying high dollar food, the main ingredient is corn. I get the cheapest dog food I can find that doesn't have corn listed first in the ingredients. Instead, it's chicken byproduct and I've never heard a chicken fart. The author's are idiots if they think most dogs eat beef.
None of the cats my wife have are allowed out. They’re strictly house cats. Never assume things my FRiend.
I’ve had neighbors who’ve let their dogs wander the neighborhood. And their bratty little kids too.
I also have a neighbor who participates in a program to trap feral cats and spay and neuter them or take out of a neighborhood to no kill shelters.
Certainly an over population of feral cats would be a problem.
So would an unchecked rodent population without the little pantherinae population to keep them in check, certainly if you live in a rural area as I do.
Look dude, your argument is bordering just a wee bit on the ridiculous so lets call it a draw ok? Pax.
A rat is a bird is a child eh?
Well some of them ate other birds.
But a lot of them just kill other birds with out the excuse of eating them.
If you want to see something truly sickening watch a blue jay sit on a chickadee and peck it to death for no reason.
Or humming birds battle.
I am so happy you have found something to argue about. Imagine a day without arguing with strangers on the internet.
Leftists want everyone as miserable as they are.
Mine are loose. I have ten, and sure didn’t want them, and soon as possible all the females are spayed. Their pregnant mothers were dumped here and I didn’t have the heart to call the pound or time to get rid of them. I had 2 of my own that were old at the time and had intended they be my last. I feared the new ones might destroy my bird-watching and force me to act, but it turns out their hunting prowess is grossly over-rated. Maybe in England where the study was done it is different due to the lack of native bobcats and thus their birds are likely ill equipped to deal with those and have evolved habits that put them at risk.
Undeniably, lizards were impacted, as well as snakes. Yet, my house has lizards all around it because I stack rocks everywhere to provide them safety for laying eggs, and the native green ones have the sense to select tall plants out of reach of cats on which to spend their days, a trick some of the invasive brown lizards have learned to improve the visibility of their colored throat flags as well. I have seen no water moccasins since the cats matured, nor water snakes, both of which used to be common, as well as Eastern diamondbacks. I don’t know if it is because of the cats, or because of the red shouldered hawks, or some other factor.
A pair of pileated woodpeckers nest in my pine trees and produce one or two clutches a year where their chicks successfully fledge and find their own sites as adults. They have no problem pecking out the new nest hole and shower wood chips down on the cats below.
Small woodpeckers and sapsuckers nest in a cluster of dead palms and I have enjoyed watching their chicks fledge and learn flying skills as the take short flights between their trees and the piliateds’ dead pine. It will be the availability of new dead pines and palms that control them, not cats.
A pair of red shouldered hawks nest nearby at my neighbors.’ Coopers and sharpies harass the wild songbirds during their migration, and harass my parrots, too. Feral parrots like Nandays and Sun conures visit the sycamore trees, as do swallowtailed kites.
Sandhill cranes stroll in my front yard. When summer rains come, great herons and wood storks and ibises stroll the wetter areas in back. The thick wax myrtles and cedars all around my yard host songbirds of many kinds, including colorful painted buntings and the plainer butterbutts. The river cane in one spot attracts its own type of warblers but cats can hardly sneak around it without making a racket.
Little blue egrets and green herons are constantly hunting for frogs and minnows around the small pond in front even when my cats are 20 feet away lounging on the driveway. Occasionally, a small alligator shows up and only then do the herons move off [and the cats too].
Doves are abundant. Bluebirds have successfully raised young every year in my bluebird boxes. Tufted titmice are always around making use of the abundant woodpecker holes made by small downy woodpeckers, and warblers fly in the trees, gathering insects for young that are safe from citrus rats and seldom bothered by snakes, both of which the cats do hunt.
I have cages of parrots and parakeets in the back yard that the cats ignore, and cardinals eagerly gather around them to snatch falled birdfeed. Unfortunately, raccoons and possums do NOT ignore caged birds, and have caused me much trouble and expense securing the pet birds and chickens from their eager paws since my dog died. The cats have driven off most of the squirrels, and thus eliminated yet another predator besides snakes and rats that raid eggs and chicks, but they are too small to deter raccoons.
A clump pf invasive Brazilian pepper attracts flocks of robins every spring, as do the cherry laurels when they have fruit in their season.
Hummingbirds visit my bottlebrush trees in droves, and when blooming, you can watch a dozen or more of them sipping from its blossoms any time you pull up a seat. You can watch all these birds from just a few feet away with a cat on your lap because the damn cats sleep 90% of the daytime and prowl at night when the screech and barred owls and poorwillswidows are out, but I doubt the cats have any chance of catching an owl...though an owl did put the fear into one of the cats.
A bobcat lurked around here originally, and once even grabbed a duck as I let them out in the morning, but I only saw it one time afterwards, and since none of these stray cats have disappeared, the bobcat, foxes, and coyotes must be gone now for some reason, probably just a temporary absence.
The things I don’t have around here are Eurasian tree sparrows, grackles, and starlings. The cats do get a number of terrestrial frogs and dragonflies but have no luck with tree frogs.
The opportunity to argue with strangers on the Internet must be pretty important to you. Why else would you take time out of your day to not only read the thread but make a stupid, worthless contribution of your own?
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