1: Pg. 65- The corn plant has colonized how much of the American continent?
120,000 square miles
2: Pg. 66-67- How have America’s food animals undergone a revolution in lifestyle?
America’s human population found itself leaving the city for the suburbs, our food animals found themselves traveling in the opposite direction, leaving widely dispersed farms in places like Iowa to live in densely populated new animal cities.
3: Pg. 67- What is a CAFO?
a system of farming which concentrates a large number of animals into a small space for maximum efficiency. Examples of CAFOs include large-scale hog farms, veal calve raising operations, egg production facilities, and other similar “factory farms.”
4: Pg. 67- What happened to the all of the farmland once the animals left? Where did all of the corn go?
Corn itself profited from the urbanization of livestock twice. As the animals left the farms, nore of the farm was left for corn, which rapidly colonized the paddocks and pastures and even the barnyards that had CAFOs.
5: Pg. 68- What is the idea of a closed ecological loop?
when animals live on farks the very idea of waste ceases to exist
6: Pg. 68- What are the two main problems with animal feedlots?
A fertility problem on the farm and a pollution problem on the feedlot
7. Pg 70- What is the coevolutionary relationship between cows and grass? Explain.
For grasses which have evolved to withstand the grazing of ruminants. For cow which single stomached creatures like us can't digest into high quality protein.
8. Pg. 71- Why would pastures become “the great American desert” without ruminant animals?
Hilly to grow crops without large amounts of irrigation, chemicals, and erosion
9. Pg. 71- What gets a steer from 80 to 1,000 pounds in just 14 months?
tremendous quantities of corn, protein and fat supplements, and an arsenal of new drugs
10. Pg. 71- Why is weaning the calves the most traumatic time on the ranch?
cows separated from their calves will mope and bellow for days
11. Pg. 73- What is the only reason contemporary animal cities aren’t as plague-ridden or pestilential as their medieval human counterparts?
the only reason contemporary animal cities arent as plague ridden or pestilential as their medieval human counterparts.
12. Pg. 73- “So if the modern CAFO is a city built upon commodity corn, it is a city afloat on an invisible sea of ____________”
13. Pg. 75- Why is corn fed meat less healthy for us?
14. Pg. 75- What practice of feeding cows led to the “Mad Cow Disease”?
15. Pg. 77- How are we choosing which cows we want to select to breed?
16. Pg. 77- What is the #1 ailment found with cows fed on corn? Why- explain.
17. Pg. 78- What is acidosis and what does it cause in the cow?
18. Pg. 78- What percentage of cows at slaughterhouses are found to have abscessed livers?
24. Pg. 83- Discuss the path of corn backward from the corn fields and discuss the implications.
The corn starts in the fields a monoculture under rain of pesticide and fertilizer. The nitrogen runs off into rivers and lakes. The fertilizer needed to grow the corn finds itself all the way to the oil fields. The implication is that it takes a lot to grow corn and growing corn has a lot of consequences to it.
25. Pg. 83- How much of America’s petroleum usage goes to producing and transporting our food?
1/5
26. Pg. 84- If a cow reaches his full weight- how much “oil” will he have consumed in lifetime?
The cow would have consumed 35 gallons of oil to reach his full weight.
27. Pg. 84- “You are what you eat” is a truism hard to argue with, and yet it is, as a visit to a feedlot suggests, incomplete, for you are what what you eat eats, too. And what we are, or have become, is not just meat but number 2 corn and oil- Discuss.
The quote is saying that not only we eat the meat from the cow, but we are eating what the cow ate in it's lifetime up until the point of being put into a slaughter house. If we are eating a cow, then we are also eating 35 gallons of oil and hundreds or thousands of pounds of corn. If we are what we eat, we are meat, oil and corn.
120,000 square miles
2: Pg. 66-67- How have America’s food animals undergone a revolution in lifestyle?
America’s human population found itself leaving the city for the suburbs, our food animals found themselves traveling in the opposite direction, leaving widely dispersed farms in places like Iowa to live in densely populated new animal cities.
3: Pg. 67- What is a CAFO?
a system of farming which concentrates a large number of animals into a small space for maximum efficiency. Examples of CAFOs include large-scale hog farms, veal calve raising operations, egg production facilities, and other similar “factory farms.”
4: Pg. 67- What happened to the all of the farmland once the animals left? Where did all of the corn go?
Corn itself profited from the urbanization of livestock twice. As the animals left the farms, nore of the farm was left for corn, which rapidly colonized the paddocks and pastures and even the barnyards that had CAFOs.
5: Pg. 68- What is the idea of a closed ecological loop?
when animals live on farks the very idea of waste ceases to exist
6: Pg. 68- What are the two main problems with animal feedlots?
A fertility problem on the farm and a pollution problem on the feedlot
7. Pg 70- What is the coevolutionary relationship between cows and grass? Explain.
For grasses which have evolved to withstand the grazing of ruminants. For cow which single stomached creatures like us can't digest into high quality protein.
8. Pg. 71- Why would pastures become “the great American desert” without ruminant animals?
Hilly to grow crops without large amounts of irrigation, chemicals, and erosion
9. Pg. 71- What gets a steer from 80 to 1,000 pounds in just 14 months?
tremendous quantities of corn, protein and fat supplements, and an arsenal of new drugs
10. Pg. 71- Why is weaning the calves the most traumatic time on the ranch?
cows separated from their calves will mope and bellow for days
11. Pg. 73- What is the only reason contemporary animal cities aren’t as plague-ridden or pestilential as their medieval human counterparts?
the only reason contemporary animal cities arent as plague ridden or pestilential as their medieval human counterparts.
12. Pg. 73- “So if the modern CAFO is a city built upon commodity corn, it is a city afloat on an invisible sea of ____________”
petroleum
13. Pg. 75- Why is corn fed meat less healthy for us?
Humans have not adapted to ruminants that eat corn. These ruminants also had to adapt to eating corn.
14. Pg. 75- What practice of feeding cows led to the “Mad Cow Disease”?
Feeding cow parts back to cows caused mad cow disease
15. Pg. 77- How are we choosing which cows we want to select to breed?
One way to look at the breeding work going on at raches like the Blairs' is that the contemporary beef cow is being selected for the ability to eat large quatities of corn and efficiently convert it to protein without too sick.
16. Pg. 77- What is the #1 ailment found with cows fed on corn? Why- explain.
Bloat, the fermentation in the rumen produces copious amounts of gasm which is normally expelled by belching during rumination.
17. Pg. 78- What is acidosis and what does it cause in the cow?
Acidosis is when the stomach of an animal is acidic. Acidotic animals go off their feed, pant and salivate excessively, paw and scratch their bellies, and eat dirt.
About 15 and 30%
19. Pg. 78- What is the leading causes of the evolution of antibiotic resistant superbugs?
Antibiotics that end up in animal feeds
20. Pg. 79- What chemicals are found in the “manure lagoon” on CAFO’s?
Nitrogen and phosphorus, heavy metals, hormone residue and persistent chemicals.
21. Pg. 80- How many pounds of corn does it take to make 4 pounds of beef? What is the ratio for chicken?
32 pounds of corn to make 4 pounds of beef. The ratio for chicken is 2:1, or 8:4.
22. Pg. 82- How has the new strain of E. Coli (O157: H7) evolved and what is the problem with it? How can this problem be fixed?
Nature to absorb the excess biomass coming off the Farm Belt. The problem with these bugs is that they can shake off the acid bath in our stomachs and then go on to kill us. It can be fixed by to reverse acidification.
23. Pg. 82- How are the costs associated with the CAFO’s externalized? Explain.
They are externalized based on environmental costs. There are things that are not added in the cost of buying corn. These costs include spraying fertilizer and pesticides and using water to grow these corn. If these externalized costs are included, corn would be a lot more expensive.
Antibiotics that end up in animal feeds
20. Pg. 79- What chemicals are found in the “manure lagoon” on CAFO’s?
Nitrogen and phosphorus, heavy metals, hormone residue and persistent chemicals.
21. Pg. 80- How many pounds of corn does it take to make 4 pounds of beef? What is the ratio for chicken?
32 pounds of corn to make 4 pounds of beef. The ratio for chicken is 2:1, or 8:4.
22. Pg. 82- How has the new strain of E. Coli (O157: H7) evolved and what is the problem with it? How can this problem be fixed?
Nature to absorb the excess biomass coming off the Farm Belt. The problem with these bugs is that they can shake off the acid bath in our stomachs and then go on to kill us. It can be fixed by to reverse acidification.
23. Pg. 82- How are the costs associated with the CAFO’s externalized? Explain.
They are externalized based on environmental costs. There are things that are not added in the cost of buying corn. These costs include spraying fertilizer and pesticides and using water to grow these corn. If these externalized costs are included, corn would be a lot more expensive.
24. Pg. 83- Discuss the path of corn backward from the corn fields and discuss the implications.
The corn starts in the fields a monoculture under rain of pesticide and fertilizer. The nitrogen runs off into rivers and lakes. The fertilizer needed to grow the corn finds itself all the way to the oil fields. The implication is that it takes a lot to grow corn and growing corn has a lot of consequences to it.
25. Pg. 83- How much of America’s petroleum usage goes to producing and transporting our food?
1/5
26. Pg. 84- If a cow reaches his full weight- how much “oil” will he have consumed in lifetime?
The cow would have consumed 35 gallons of oil to reach his full weight.
27. Pg. 84- “You are what you eat” is a truism hard to argue with, and yet it is, as a visit to a feedlot suggests, incomplete, for you are what what you eat eats, too. And what we are, or have become, is not just meat but number 2 corn and oil- Discuss.
The quote is saying that not only we eat the meat from the cow, but we are eating what the cow ate in it's lifetime up until the point of being put into a slaughter house. If we are eating a cow, then we are also eating 35 gallons of oil and hundreds or thousands of pounds of corn. If we are what we eat, we are meat, oil and corn.