Shelter is good for all stock. The old timers new this and grew trees down fence lines so animals could have shelter in extremes. When driving past properties with the shelter belts stock are always using them during extremes.
Today, farmers are removing the shelter belts all in the name of efficiency because the shelter belts reduce grass growth under them and make it harder to irrigate.
But damn the animals, at least they have maximised and and can now fully capitalize.
They're also used as wind breaks. Lots of benefits to the things the old timers did that new stock just tosses out from lack of understanding and lots of over confidence that they know better.
It applies to dev work as well, with all of these new fangled fancy ways of doing things because people think they know better. Can things be improved, surely, but there's a lot of things we've "improved" just to recreate the same traps we've already been through. It is tiresome
Removing the shelter belts is also making the same mistakes as they made in the 1920s that lead to the Dust Bowl in the 1930s. The lack of wind-breaks created the conditions for massive dust storms that destroyed both current crops and insane amounts of topsoil that got blown away.
But no one cares about history. And so everyone becomes the ignorant herd condemned to repeat history.
> Today, farmers are removing the shelter belts all in the name of efficiency because the shelter belts reduce grass growth under them and make it harder to irrigate.
Do you have a source for that? Because I googled a bit, and found nothing.
The photos I found of animals in hot weather with no tree cover are for places where trees don't grow.
> Today, farmers are removing the shelter belts all in the name of efficiency because the shelter belts reduce grass growth under them and make it harder to irrigate.
This explanation makes no sense. Why would it be harder to irrigate? And who cares about the small amount of grass under a row of trees? It's not like you have trees every 20 feet.
> But damn the animals, at least they have maximised and and can now fully capitalize.
This also makes no sense - healthier animals are more productive, even if the only motivation you acknowledge is money.
I had always thought that the farmers left the trees on the property line because they're just so dang much trouble to cut down with nothing but manual labor and they make a good property line.
Something that's interesting is that most of our agricultural crops are bred for full sun (ie, a big flat field). I wonder if there's room for new partial-shade versions of crops, so they work better alongside solar panels. I doubt they'd be as productive in an absolute sense (less light = less total energy), but adding on solar panels value to the output of that land would likely be better than single-use of either.
There are many studies examining the potential of agrivoltaics (it even has a Wikipedia page), and they find just as you suggest: the combined output of electricity + crops is better than doing either one alone, but the electric and crop is a bit less than devoting the field to either purpose solely, as it would need to be.
Efficiency increases are often 30% or more.
Some people get really, irrationally upset about solar being put on farm fields, but it really helps both the farmer and society to do that.
Permaculture and agroforestry touch on this a lot. In permaculture designs usually photosynthesis per acre is maximized by planting guilds of crops that work well together – in this case, larger trees with shade-loving shrubs beneath them, and beneficial ground cover beneath them as well.
Towards the more conventional end of agroforestry, rows of trees are separated with rows of crops, grains, etc. There's lots of benefits to this way of farming, though it's still 'new' to a lot of people.
I think the crop or the plants would have to change a lot. Currently it's pretty easy to see which areas get full sun and which don't when you drive by a corn field in growing season.
Ginseng needs shade(1), farmers should install solar over ginseng crops. However, I suspect they need to drive equipment through at times. I wonder if there are solar installations where the panel can go perpendicular to the ground to allow tractors through?
> While sheep are considered the gold star for solar because they don’t jump on panels, goats have long been used for utility and pipeline maintenance and perimeter maintenance (or maintaining vegetation around the borders of a site) in countries like France.
From a 2020 article on the topic. Sorry goats, you are not the "gold standard" here.
Put the wiring in PVC pipe, and make sure the panel's junction box wires are secured tightly inside the inner folds (or use products that secure them).
(I can't read the full article due to the paywall, but) another framing of this is: farmers can supplement their income by renting out their sheep to help solar farms manage the vegetation around the panels:
It's complicated. Some places in the world, livestock is grown quite sustainably and are basically neutral climate-wise. Other places, it is an unmitigated ecological disaster (clearing rain forest, for example). Because we produce so much around the world, on average, it is pretty bad.
Generally, livestock takes more land than grain crops in order to produce the same calories. However, there is more to nutrition than simple calories, so optimising for calories per hectare is probably not the right answer either. I once saw a report suggesting that you can feed more people with less total impact if you include livestock in the mix because livestock can graze on more marginal land than you can farm crops on. I am not qualified to comment on the veracity of that report.
I think, in the end, going vegan for climate change reasons is an extreme and unjustified position. On the other hand, almost everyone can stand to eat less meat than they currently do and would probably be healthier for it (myself, included). If we reduce overall meat consumption, it would definitely be a net win for climate and ecology reasons as we could concentrate on producing more sustainably on average than we currently do.
Sheep, like cows, are ruminants and ruminants burp methane, which is a greenhouse gas. Per unit of lamb or beef, about two-three times[1] as much of greenhouseunits ("CO₂ - equivalents") is produced than for pork. Chicken has an even lower carbon footprint.
I think it is evident that many in the Western world eat more meat than they need to to stay healthy. The best for your health and the environment is probably to eat an as varied diet as possible, with lots of vegetables to complement your meat/protein intake.
[1] numbers differ depending on who you ask, and on which farms were measured.
You might also change your meat choice. Chicken is far better than pork, which is far better than beef. No need to instantly go cold turkey on meat if it doesn't suit you.
[+] [-] pleb_nz|3 years ago|reply
Today, farmers are removing the shelter belts all in the name of efficiency because the shelter belts reduce grass growth under them and make it harder to irrigate.
But damn the animals, at least they have maximised and and can now fully capitalize.
[+] [-] dylan604|3 years ago|reply
It applies to dev work as well, with all of these new fangled fancy ways of doing things because people think they know better. Can things be improved, surely, but there's a lot of things we've "improved" just to recreate the same traps we've already been through. It is tiresome
[+] [-] toss1|3 years ago|reply
But no one cares about history. And so everyone becomes the ignorant herd condemned to repeat history.
[+] [-] anigbrowl|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ars|3 years ago|reply
Do you have a source for that? Because I googled a bit, and found nothing.
The photos I found of animals in hot weather with no tree cover are for places where trees don't grow.
> Today, farmers are removing the shelter belts all in the name of efficiency because the shelter belts reduce grass growth under them and make it harder to irrigate.
This explanation makes no sense. Why would it be harder to irrigate? And who cares about the small amount of grass under a row of trees? It's not like you have trees every 20 feet.
> But damn the animals, at least they have maximised and and can now fully capitalize.
This also makes no sense - healthier animals are more productive, even if the only motivation you acknowledge is money.
[+] [-] readthenotes1|3 years ago|reply
I had always thought that the farmers left the trees on the property line because they're just so dang much trouble to cut down with nothing but manual labor and they make a good property line.
[+] [-] colechristensen|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cschneid|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] epistasis|3 years ago|reply
Efficiency increases are often 30% or more.
Some people get really, irrationally upset about solar being put on farm fields, but it really helps both the farmer and society to do that.
[+] [-] danohuiginn|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gdubs|3 years ago|reply
Towards the more conventional end of agroforestry, rows of trees are separated with rows of crops, grains, etc. There's lots of benefits to this way of farming, though it's still 'new' to a lot of people.
[+] [-] chucksta|3 years ago|reply
Looks like its being tested though https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/food-and-farms/can-agri...
[+] [-] ClumsyPilot|3 years ago|reply
Some crops need shade, most often berries. Shade in Spain and Shade in North Scotland are very different of course.
[+] [-] giarc|3 years ago|reply
1 - https://www.google.ca/search?q=ginseng+field
[+] [-] dcuthbertson|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] toomuchtodo|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eyear|3 years ago|reply
https://youtu.be/Azj3OrEtkP4
[+] [-] JauntyHatAngle|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] exq|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Fiahil|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] epistasis|3 years ago|reply
From a 2020 article on the topic. Sorry goats, you are not the "gold standard" here.
https://www.utilitydive.com/news/sheep-ag-and-sun-agrivoltai...
[+] [-] coding123|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bilsbie|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] del82|3 years ago|reply
https://smallfarms.cornell.edu/2020/07/solar-grazing-livesto...
[+] [-] beembeem|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rripken|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] krupan|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] goodcanadian|3 years ago|reply
Generally, livestock takes more land than grain crops in order to produce the same calories. However, there is more to nutrition than simple calories, so optimising for calories per hectare is probably not the right answer either. I once saw a report suggesting that you can feed more people with less total impact if you include livestock in the mix because livestock can graze on more marginal land than you can farm crops on. I am not qualified to comment on the veracity of that report.
I think, in the end, going vegan for climate change reasons is an extreme and unjustified position. On the other hand, almost everyone can stand to eat less meat than they currently do and would probably be healthier for it (myself, included). If we reduce overall meat consumption, it would definitely be a net win for climate and ecology reasons as we could concentrate on producing more sustainably on average than we currently do.
[+] [-] Findecanor|3 years ago|reply
I think it is evident that many in the Western world eat more meat than they need to to stay healthy. The best for your health and the environment is probably to eat an as varied diet as possible, with lots of vegetables to complement your meat/protein intake.
[1] numbers differ depending on who you ask, and on which farms were measured.
[+] [-] beachy|3 years ago|reply
You might also change your meat choice. Chicken is far better than pork, which is far better than beef. No need to instantly go cold turkey on meat if it doesn't suit you.
[+] [-] danans|3 years ago|reply
Traditional grazing doesn't achieve the scale of industrial agriculture though, so the products are more expensive.
You don't have to "go vegan" but reducing animal product consumption in general is an accessible way to minimize your climate change impact.
[+] [-] myself248|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ragebol|3 years ago|reply
Raising millions if not billions of sheep, that's bad for the environment.
But you knew this already...