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Devastating wheat fungus appears in Asia for first time

nature.com

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Re: Devastating wheat fungus appears in Asia for first time

#21

Post by CapitalistCartr »

hga wrote: post #20
GFK_of_xmaspast wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't be absurd. There are dozens of wheat pathogens alone (here's my favorite: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stem_rust ) and we as a civilization have been dealing with them for a long long time.

Indeed, read a infectious disease news collection source like http://promedmail.org/ long enough and you might be surprised we have anything to eat beyond Soylent Green. Everything you love to eat has a host of pathogens that want to eat it first.

Try gardening/farming. Starting with eggs. Snakes, weasels, raccoons, even the hens want them. Hawks want my chicks, as do snakes, raccoons, weasels, foxes, bobcats, and coyotes. Weasels, coyotes, foxes want the pullets and adult hens. Its like anything I want to raise is a buffet for nature. On the other hand, I have an electric fence.

Re: Devastating wheat fungus appears in Asia for first time

#22

Post by Detect »

hga wrote: post #19
Detect wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Feed Conversion Ratio (FCR) for cattle is about 10, pig 3, sheep 5, and chicken 2. That means we could feed about 10 times more people per hectacre on grains than using that grain as feed for beef. Ruminants are important for nutrient cycling and other ecosystem services, but far from efficient as a food source for humans. They are best utilized on marginal land where agriculture isn't ideal. https://en.wikipedia.org…

Yeah, in the US at least, the normal pattern is to raise cows on pastures, sometimes out in the dry west fantastic acreage of it, 1,000 acre ranches can be considered tiny, 10s of thousands are not uncommon, and/or including grazing rights. Then they're sent to a feed lot for some period of time to fatten up. Ah, from the article you linked: " However, comparisons of FCR among different species may be of little signi…

I agree with you that it's mostly feedlot grains that we could redirect to humans, and that feedlot grains is a surprising amount of what we produce in total.

"More than half the U.S. grain and nearly 40 percent of world grain is being fed to livestock rather than being consumed directly by humans"

http://news.cornell.edu/stories/1997/08/us-could-feed-800-mi...

Re: Devastating wheat fungus appears in Asia for first time

#23

Post by hga »

Detect wrote: post #22
hga wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, in the US at least, the normal pattern is to raise cows on pastures, sometimes out in the dry west fantastic acreage of it, 1,000 acre ranches can be considered tiny, 10s of thousands are not uncommon, and/or including grazing rights. Then they're sent to a feed lot for some period of time to fatten up. Ah, from the article you linked: " However, comparisons of FCR among different species may be of little signi…

I agree with you that it's mostly feedlot grains that we could redirect to humans, and that feedlot grains is a surprising amount of what we produce in total. "More than half the U.S. grain and nearly 40 percent of world grain is being fed to livestock rather than being consumed directly by humans" http://news.cornell.edu/stories/1997/08/us-could-feed-800-mi...

And in the US, corn burned for ethanol, which is 40% or so of it. Now plenty of that food value is passed on to animals, the largest byproduct is "distillers dried grains with solubles (DDGS)", which is 31% by weight of the original corn, so it's not entirely wasted on that boondoggle today, but all of it could be redirected. Europe also has biofuels programs, doesn't it?

The title of your link: "U.S. could feed 800 million people with grain that livestock eat, Cornell ecologist advises animal scientists"

What, and give them type 2 diabetes?!?!!

Seriously, a lot of the usual suspects should reconsider their animus towards animal husbandry in the light of the increasing evidence the move to a low fat, high carbohydrate diet caused and is causing untold morbidity and mortality.

Re: Devastating wheat fungus appears in Asia for first time

#24

Post by TrevorJ »

maxerickson wrote: post #8
goda90 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting premise. I wonder if civilization would collapse, or if we'd be able to adapt our agriculture to more legumes and other vegetables quickly enough to avoid mass starvation.

The US plants more soy than wheat already so the adapting part would probably go OK. The bigger question would be the math about calories (it probably works out, meat production consumes a lot of calories). I guess we could also plant lots of potatoes (which produce more calories/acre than soy).

Topsoil erosion would be a massive problem.

Re: Devastating wheat fungus appears in Asia for first time

#25

Post by hga »

CapitalistCartr wrote: post #21
hga wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, read a infectious disease news collection source like http://promedmail.org/ long enough and you might be surprised we have anything to eat beyond Soylent Green. Everything you love to eat has a host of pathogens that want to eat it first.

Try gardening/farming. Starting with eggs. Snakes, weasels, raccoons, even the hens want them. Hawks want my chicks, as do snakes, raccoons, weasels, foxes, bobcats, and coyotes. Weasels, coyotes, foxes want the pullets and adult hens. Its like anything I want to raise is a buffet for nature. On the other hand, I have an electric fence.

So many people have stopped their small scale chicken raising/egg production, like one family I know, after they learned "fox in the hen-house" isn't just a turn of phrase.

Both my parents grew up on farms, and we kept a big garden when I was growing up, so I know this very well, although reading the article that link collects for many months was serious sobering.

Re: Devastating wheat fungus appears in Asia for first time

#26

Post by hga »

TrevorJ wrote: post #24
maxerickson wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US plants more soy than wheat already so the adapting part would probably go OK. The bigger question would be the math about calories (it probably works out, meat production consumes a lot of calories). I guess we could also plant lots of potatoes (which produce more calories/acre than soy).

Topsoil erosion would be a massive problem.

That's something you start worrying about after you make sure no one is likely to starve, it can most likely wait a couple of years.

Re: Devastating wheat fungus appears in Asia for first time

#28

Post by schiffern »

TrevorJ wrote: post #24
maxerickson wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US plants more soy than wheat already so the adapting part would probably go OK. The bigger question would be the math about calories (it probably works out, meat production consumes a lot of calories). I guess we could also plant lots of potatoes (which produce more calories/acre than soy).

Topsoil erosion would be a massive problem.

Topsoil erosion is already a massive problem.[1] So far we've been able to mask the damage by substituting fossil fuel inputs for soil fertility, but realistically soil husbandry is the only sustainable way to grow food.

Heck, many people nowadays aren't even aware that soil organisms can manufacture bio-available nutrients from local minerals and the air.[2] The dominant view of soil seems to be as an inert tank that needs to be "refilled" with imported fertility.

[1] http://www.fao.org/docrep/t0389e/t0389e02.htm

[2] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2H60ritjag

Re: Devastating wheat fungus appears in Asia for first time

#29

Post by TrevorJ »

hga wrote: post #26
TrevorJ wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Topsoil erosion would be a massive problem.

That's something you start worrying about after you make sure no one is likely to starve, it can most likely wait a couple of years.

Actually, it's something you worry about now if you don't want people to starve.

Re: Devastating wheat fungus appears in Asia for first time

#30

Post by hga »

TrevorJ wrote: post #29
hga wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's something you start worrying about after you make sure no one is likely to starve, it can most likely wait a couple of years.

Actually, it's something you worry about now if you don't want people to starve.

This discussion is in the context of a sudden failure of a variety of crops, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Death_of_Grass

In that context, for a couple or so of years you don't worry about soil erosion, except to avoid a repeat of the Dust Bowl, you worry about people not starving. Before AKA "now", and after the emergency period, yes, you worry about it, as we do now.

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