Ever not known how you feel about something?

[tallywhacker]

"Erm, no they don't. I used to work in a slaughter house as a kid and even back then tumored or diseased animals were disposed of. I am a "qualified" trained hunter through a government scheme and I can tell you right now that tumored or diseased animals are not used for ANYTHING. I suspect at least one of the members here will be most perturbed by your assumption that he is selling diseased or unfit meat."

1) [...] and other ailments - just ignore that part it's ok, well no it really isn't. Ailments is a broad broad term.
2) I said earlier my knowledge is on a global level not a uk level; 'most' encompasses the rest of the world, of which the UK is a small part.
3) I see you have beento some degree contested below and are now rolling back to personal observation and 'but rules'.

Honestly if you want to nit pick at me at least read what i wrote fully first and consider a broader world view.

I havn't seen global data because no such global data exists pertaining to health ailments in cattle, not all agencies comply. However when my university peers tell me most studies show the majority of animals need to be constantly medicated to deal with ailments up until slaughter and that some countries now go as far as allowing tumours i don't feel the need to challenge that because a guy who used to work in a UK slaughter house deems it ok to apply the UK standards to the rest of the world without checking..

Yes, this one was meant to be a bit bitchy. It is getting a bit annoying dealing replies from several people that are ill considered to be quite honest. Most replies aimed at me on this thread have been either nit picky, trying to imply i'm stupid or both. I havnt presumed you or anyone else to be an idiot and dismissed whatever you said on face value while ignoring words in your posts AFAIK. I would expect the same courtesy. AFAIK i have done all i can to word my posts in a constructive and well mannered way up until now. Good day.

 

[wingstoo]

We had fields of what looked like peas around our way a few years ago, they were left way past their best before being harvested so probably weren't for food crop anyway.

Maize is a reasonably quick and easy crop to grow and there is a huge of excess material available even after the cobs are removed. The fuel we put in our cars etc everyday has something like a 5% additive from bio production (http://www.ukpia.com/Libraries/Download/biofuels_in_the_UK_February_2012.sflb.ashx), a few years back they wanted to increase that to 10% but we didn't have enough available space to grow it so it got dropped.

There are apparently more fat people in the world than starving people (http://www.forbes.com/sites/timwors...are-now-more-obese-people-than-hungry-people/), the world has more than enough food produced and the UK disposes of over 57,000 tonnes of the stuff every year from one super market chain, that is 1000 tonnes a week from one supermarket chain, and there are several chains in the UK doing the same sort of thing.

The problem isn't not enough food, it is also down to bad distribution and over production, and supermarket purchasers being to picky over what they accept.

I have done work for a fruit farm and packing plant where they dispose of lorry loads of fruit driven from the South of France and Spain because it is a bit over ripe, that has cost thousands to produce, pack and ship, to use as land fill...

The new crop production rules being imposed will probably have something to do with the amount of fuel crops being produced? so no set aside being added to the formula and no subsidies for set aside fields will have crops grown in them for best profit.

It isn't really madness, its economics...

 

[widu13]

However when my university peers tell me...

Really?

Look; there have been some sweeping statements made by you and others. My reply has been factual. I am not in the meat business nor work for "them". Before I pay too much notice to what is presented to me I like to know the facts, or at least more. I'm sorry if you feel hard done by this or me.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk now Free

 

[tallywhacker]

Really?

Look; there have been some sweeping statements made by you and others. My reply has been factual. I am not in the meat business nor work for "them". Before I pay too much notice to what is presented to me I like to know the facts, or at least more. I'm sorry if you feel hard done by this or me.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk now Free

And by yourself it would appear (RE sweeping statements)

And no i'm not making it up (RE really?). This is generally the accepted consensus with the students/peers i normally engage on such topics. You will see that where i have made a mistake and have been pulled up on it that i have since checked and admitted a mistake. I have nothing to gain by making stuff up which is the implication of you comment. If i am misinformed (RE the state of cattle getting to slaughter), it is from what i consider a credible source

Nothing wrong with asking for a source, however i am used to simply being asked if i have a source opposed to someone picking at one word of what i say in a quote that only shows part of what i said. In the science world it is perfectly acceptable to not have to check sources on a generally accepted consensus, therefore i cant say i have ever felt the need to call anyone out on what i have mirrored into this discussion.

If you are genuinely not trying to nit pick i do apologise. The earlier responses have set me on edge a bit as they where all negative and i am relatively new on this site, it came across a bit clicky to say the least. I am quite sure if you re read the responses i have had aimed at me and see how they have all focused on minor parts of what i have said you can probably see why i have come to this conclusion and got a bit 'tetchy'. I don't see this as an illogical conclusion from where i am sat..

TBH i hope i have misconstrued things regarding the nit picking etc, i would rather be wrong about this and realise i am welcome here opposed to be right about it and wonder why i bothered engaging people in the first place. As it is i wish i hadn't have bothered to be quite honest. ><

 

[andybysea]

The only thing i noticed in this thread are a few comments in the first couple of posts refering to ''cheap food'' and ''cheap meat'' i for one dont find food/meat cheap at all, yes the iceland stuff maybe(dont touch it) but food and meat from the higher quality places certainly isnt cheap at all.

 

[Ecoman]

Back on topic!

I'm also a bit unsure about how I feel about the OP's topic. I was down in Lincolnshire less than a month ago and I took a drive from Horncastle to Huttoft to do a spot of fishing. On the way I saw field upon field of Maize and even more planted with some sort of tall grass (I later found out its called elephant grass). I was chatting to my mate and we were reminiscing about our days on the Brussels, peas and Tatties in these fields and how times and trends move on. He then told me that all the crops in the fields we had just passed were going to be used to make electricity in one way or another. The maize for biogas and the elephant grass was used to fire power stations. To say I was stunned was an understatement. On the way back I was looking at the contents of the fields and it started to dawn on me how much area of land is being taken up with the intent to grow electricity. I was just seeing one small section of a whole bigger picture!

 

[cave_dweller]

We import corn burning fossil fuels to ship it at the same time as rotting down home grown corn to make electricity. How can that be efficient?

In real terms, it isn't efficient. The trouble is, the convoluted economics involved means that each step of the process appears to make economic sense (subsidies, import taxes, categorisation of land for various uses etc etc). When you look at the full life-cycle though, it just doesn't add up. I'm deeply sceptical about the efficiency of using land to create bio-fuels to start with though.

 

[Toddy]

It's just a crop, BR, just like any other one. That it's end purpose is to provide energy instead of food most probably means that it's needed less insecticides and the like, so it might actually have supported a greater biodiversity than the average sprayed and dosed into sterility, food crop field.

For the record, I would throw in the following comments

1, Humans are the cooking ape. Our digestive systems allow us to exploit all manner of foodstuffs, if we cook it first. The earliest evidences we have of hominids and fire use are hundreds of thousands of years old, and long pre-date the emergence of homo sapiens sapiens. Our short gut and peculiar teeth and mouth/throat/voicebox took a long while to evolve, and the roots of the change are there alongside the use of fire.

2, I know two slaughtermen who both get 'nightshift' work, and both say quite clearly that there's meat going into the foodchain that they wouldn't eat but it's money all round, and everyone has bills to pay.

3, Read 'Diet for a Small Planet', it's kind of an eye-opener. Food production of meat is decimating everything from virgin forests to traditional societies, and causes horrendous pollution of watercourses in the use as sewage disposal and the concommitant issues of antibiotics, etc., leaching into the riverine systems.

4, Unless we live in a one world state, with all the controls and interconnectedness of supply and demand, then things have to be viewed as individual cycles.
Bio energy needs a source, this crop is simply the source. That it 'could' be food it irrelevant to that particular energy cycle.

5, I grew up post war when the warcry was still, "Don't waste food!", but the realisation comes into play that we just simply can't eat all the food we produce anyway, so this crop isn't food; this crop is fuel.

Interesting topic interesting discussion
Thank you

cheers,
Toddy

 

[Dave]

Scientists can now 'grow' near perfect meat in a petri dish, [cultured beef], which will be perfected, and prove a far economically superior method to the farming of animals.

http://news.nationalgeographic.co.uk/news/2013/08/130806-lab-grown-beef-burger-eat-meat-science/

Lab Grown Burgers will become the norm, very quickly.

[The Ranchers in the USA would go nuts, as would farmers worldwide.
The governments will compensate them with money stolen from the taxpayer.
In the end its all about the money, and the monetary system is completely crooked, the biggest scam in the world. Thats what really needs addressing. The banks will need another trillion pound bailout within the next ten years. Which is pure unadulterated theft. Personally I hope we see a revolution. The banking crisis drove more than a hundred million people back into poverty, the mortality statistics of people who go into poverty, rise hugely.
So, the banking crisis isn't just about becoming poorer, its directly responsible for killing people as well. Dont see that link made on the BBC though do you?
Its completely true though.
The global market for meat will double by the middle of the century, there'll be over 9 billion of us, wars over resources, and we'll need to be producing over 50% more food than we do now, and the global food supply will change rapidly. ]

 

[tallywhacker]

1, Humans are the cooking ape. Our digestive systems allow us to exploit all manner of foodstuffs, if we cook it first. The earliest evidences we have of hominids and fire use are hundreds of thousands of years old, and long pre-date the emergence of homo sapiens sapiens. Our short gut and peculiar teeth and mouth/throat/voicebox took a long while to evolve, and the roots of the change are there alongside the use of fire.

Interesting reading, i had been told we where slowly adapting to eat meats and root veggies that where not raw; however i did not realise we had actually evolved to eat the cooked foods already to such an extent. That provokes many thoughts.. Cheers for pointing that out

 

[Toddy]

No other way to make use of ripe grains, and the best way to make use of meat that our teeth (or tongues; remember big cats actually tongue the flesh to make it small, to remove it from bones, etc.,; don't let a lion lick you, it can take the skin off your arm with one swipe) and tongues cannot break down effectively. Our guts aren't long enough for the entire break down of the meat either. Cooking changes that greatly in our favour.
It also means that we can feed carbohydrate rich food to infants and they can digest it effectively.......which all leads to the population growth as more babies survive.

I think banks are like the grains of rice and the chess board analogy.
One grain on the first square, then two on the next, doubled to four, then to eight.....by the time you get half way round the board the pile is bigger than the world

cheers,
M

 

[British Red]

The only thing i noticed in this thread are a few comments in the first couple of posts refering to ''cheap food'' and ''cheap meat'' i for one dont find food/meat cheap at all, yes the iceland stuff maybe(dont touch it) but food and meat from the higher quality places certainly isnt cheap at all.

Food spend as a proportion of income has risen a very small amount in recent years but is still near the all time low. In real terms for example food spend has fallen about 20% since 1980.

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploa...3302/foodpocketbook-2012edition-09apr2013.pdf

Historically a third (33%) of overall household spend was on food - its around 15% now.

How much do we spend on food?
Surveys which measure such matters began in the late 1950s in the UK and on average some 33% of overall expenditure or £4.72 (or rather the equivalent in shillings and pence) was spent on food and (non-alcoholic) drink. The percentage declined over time to more like 15% as we approached the credit crunch. So we saw a measure of improving living-standards and the amount required to feed a family declined compared to income.
However the credit crunch era looks as though it has begun a reversal of this relationship as over the subsequent years the percentage of household income spent on food has risen to 16.6% in 2011. A reversal? We will have to see. But the interesting component of this is that it has been driven by falling disposable income levels because if we use 2011 prices then disposable income in 2011 was £637 in 2008 but only £587 in 2011.
So we know that there has been a relative squeeze in that falling real income levels have made food feel more expensive. We also know that these falls in real income levels continued through 2012 and into 2013 up to now.
As ever care is needed with any survey as there are always distortions and so rather maddeningly we mostly only find out major changes in trend with quite a delay!

http://www.mindfulmoney.co.uk/wp/sh...s-it-the-era-of-the-supermarket-that-is-over/

I think its fair to say that food is still relatively cheap compared to most of recent history

 

[Toddy]

I agree, I really do.
My Mum died when I was fourteen; I've been a housewife ever since. In proportion to my budget, food is much cheaper now. Big supermarkets have their detractors and their limitations, but they do make an enormous range of foods available and it is possible to eat not just healthily, but with a really good variety, all year round, and on a tight budget, than ever before.
We are very lucky in the 'first' world.

The unfortunate bit though is that often the 'ready meals' bear no reality to good honest home grown and cooked dinners. They can still be nutritious though.

cheers,
M

 

[feralpig]

The only reason a Farmer can justify growing crops to feed his bio digester, is because of subsidies. If it was left to the market, it wouldn't be happening. A Bio digester is a great place to invest a spare million quid.
Guess who's carrying the can for it? You are, with taxes and tariffs on your energy bills.

A farmers purpose is no longer to produce food. There is plenty of that already produced, and it is cheaper to import it, not to mention the fact that it honours the UKs trade agreements with other countrys. If we don't buy off them, they can't buy off others, and we can't sell it someone else. Makes perfect sense.

A Farmer, is now a "guardian of the countryside", that is what they get their subsidies for doing, guarding the countryside. Somewhat ironic, given their track record.
Producing food is secondary, to maintaining a good environment, or whatever DEFRA says is a good environment.

 

[Jared]

Jared:

That cow expends a lot of energy just to move given it's mass. They have to near constantly eat to live, not at all efficient as a herbivore. The only thing a cow is efficient at is gaining nutrients from grass, which means carrying 6 extra stomachs (thus extra weight/size) while eating. Consider the many joules of energy a cow converts/transfers in it's lifespan, and by the farmers/machinery keeping them. Compare that to how many joules of energy are on your plate...

Furthermore we are not carnivores, we evolved from frugivore primates. Any modern day bio anthropolgist worth their salt will tell you that. We are not even 'definitely' omnivores as is now the accepted norm. Evolutionary biologists still debate whether we are omnivores or frugivores Our dental structure is still likened to a frugivore yet our digestive systems are starting to adapt, albeit not enough to consume raw meat or most root vegetables

We as humans are less efficient at eating meat than fruit and leafy greens, that is a hard fact. Efficiency with meat comes in the guise of having to eat less for your calories, and the fact that the animal is gut loaded on stuff you would have to gather anyway; not being more adept at digesting/processing it. It is basically the easy option.

Over population really wouldn't be as big a problem as is currently if the said population was more efficient with how it obtains and uses it's energy. I mean energy in a broad physics sense here. Waste is the problem and topic of this thread thus food selection is indeed a vital factor.

And we have to expend energy to turn vegetation into something we'd consider eating.

There is also the fact that alot of land is unsuitable to grow crops. Like Wales, for instance, large parts have poor soil unsuitable for crop growing, so raising livestock is far more common.

So it isn't just a simple of matter swapping diets.

 

[Stew]

I think I have a similar uncertainty when I see the masses of pumpkins for sale, knowing barely any will be eaten. I wonder if many kids actually consider them edible (not that I like the taste myself, though I suspect they're bread for size, shape, etc with no care for taste)

 

[Ecoman]

Not in our house!!! Its my favourite time of the year. My daughter gets her lanterns and we all eat pumpkin pie and soup!!

 

[British Red]

I read recently on another forum that the majority of a pumpkins nutritional value and calories is in its seeds - so toast those munchies as well!

 

[Toddy]

I can't get used to pumpkins I try, I really do, but they end up worm food
I make lanterns from great big neeps Much scarier as they shrink out and shrivel up like those shrunken human heads.

I like pumpkin seeds, but I can't get my home made ones you know what I mean, to be as tasty as the bought ones; mine always end up feeling as though I'm eating those wee hard inner bits of apple core

Recipe/advice gratefully accepted

cheers,
M

 

[British Red]

Pumpkin soup is great - like parsnip soup - kind of earthy and filling and takes well to some spice

Here's how BB does it

http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=33653