Page 6 - Summer2010

Letters

periencing early peri-menopause. I had her irrationally and spent endless hours are not included in these figures.
eaten soy products daily for years. Ac- in bed. Eliot Coleman, author of The New
cording to “experts,” I shouldn’t have Nevertheless, it took me weeks to Organic Grower, hits the ball squarely at
these symptoms! work up the nerve to actually let dead the petrochemical industry. “The culprit
I finally agreed to food allergy test- animals pass into my mouth. I heard is not meat eating but rather the excesses
ing and the results came back positive many horror stories over the years of of the corporate-industrial agriculture.”
for almost all the foods I ate on a daily vegetarians vomiting meat at first bite. And he adds, “If I butcher a steer for my
basis. When I eliminated the major of- I settled on seafood as my first carnivo- food, and that steer has been raised on
fenders, thank god, the headaches dis- rous meal because, if need be, fishing grass on my farm, I am not responsible
appeared. But without my usual protein was a killing act I could most easily for any increased CO . . . A vegetarian
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sources—dairy and soy—I could barely imagine myself actually performing. eating tofu made in a factory from soy-
function. Consistently, my ever-patient Holding my breath, I put the first forkful beans grown in Brazil is responsible for
naturopathic doctor kept raising the in. . . and immediately noticed (not that a lot more CO than I am.”
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suggestion of adding meat to my diet I said it out loud) how good it tasted! In Joel Salatin, sustainable farmer and
or, more accurately, tiptoed around the fact, I had to force myself not to make a author of six books, goes a step further.
subject, since I would bite her head off spectacle of myself inhaling the entire Since plants remove carbon from the
(yes, a non-violent vegetarian) every fish in the restaurant. air and fix it in the earth, he argues that
time she brought up the idea. Gradually my health ratcheted up- animals living on pasture improve soil
Desperate to find food that would ward. Headaches, exhaustion, insomnia, quality with their manure and therefore,
nurture rather than sicken me, one day digestive problems, blood sugar and actually reduce carbon emissions.

a long-forgotten memory floated up from mood swings, frequent coughs and Thomas Harttung concurs. Hart-
shortly after reading Robbins’ book colds, a lifetime of gradually increasing tung operates the world’s largest CSA
twelve years earlier. I was fervently health problems all improved on a steady through his Aarstiderne farm in Den-
explaining to a stranger at a party why upswing. Nevertheless, it took close to mark where he grazes one hundred fifty
I thought a plant-based diet was, in fact, six months before I stopped feeling like head of cattle. “With proper manage-
the next natural step in human evolu- I was starving. ment, pastoralists, ranchers and farmers
tion and he simply replied, “Good luck But what about the claims of envi- could achieve a 2 percent increase in
explaining that (vegetarianism) to all the ronmentalists that you can’t be serious soil-carbon levels on existing agricul-
indigenous peoples of the world!” about the movement without decreasing tural, grazing and desert lands over the
For some reason that recollection or eliminating meat altogether? Michael next two decades.” This is an astound-
opened an internal floodgate previously Pollan shed new light on this question ing claim when some experts estimate
held under lock and key. I lay my head for me in The Omnivore’s Dilemma: that only a 1 percent increase in soil-
down on the kitchen table and wept “Much of the carbon footprint of beef carbon is necessary to capture the total
uncontrollably as doubts about my three comes from growing grain to feed ani- equivalent of all the world’s greenhouse
decades of vegetarianism washed over mals, which requires fossil fuel-based gas emissions. If Harttung’s figures are
me. fertilizers, pesticides and transporta- correct, then the proper management of
If this decision had affected only tion.” livestock grazing is, in fact, a powerful
myself, I probably would be vegetarian The information in Robbins’ books tool for reducing emissions globally.
to this day, albeit a dead or dying one. only represents the effects of large-scale Furthermore, it means the consump-
But I was the only parent my daughter feedlot operations, not livestock liv- tion of locally produced, pastured meat,
had. And I knew she deserved a better ing naturally on grass. Animals living dairy and eggs actually improves our
mother than someone who snapped at healthy lives on small, diversified farms environment by fixing more carbon into
6 Wise Traditions SUMMER 2010