Reply #12: Will there be 120 million cows in the US 15-20 yrs from now?

[NickB79]

If either Peak Oil or global warming hits us hard over the next few decades, I doubt farmers will be raising anywhere near that number of cattle. For that matter, I doubt we will be raising much livestock of any sort, be they cattle, hogs, chickens, etc. The number of cattle in the US is far above their natural carrying capacity compared to if they were raised primariy on grazing land. Even the cattle currently grazed on public lands in the West are over their carrying capacity there and are damaging the land and streams.

Use of highly nutritious grains allows us to raise far more cattle per acre of land than through grazing, but if there are disruptions in the ability to grow that grain (such as Peak Oil reducing the amount of diesel fuel and fertilizers available to farmers, or global warming altering weather patterns over the Great Plains), we cannot raise as many cattle. We would have to devote our remaining grain-growing capacity to human consumption, not livestock. You then run into the problem of burning valuable diesel fuel to transport the cow manure to the processing plants (I doubt it would be very efficient to build a mini-generator on each and every dairy farm throughout the US).

It's a fair bet that the average American will not be consuming nearly as much meat or dairy per capita 20 yrs from now as we consume today.