Blog Post 2

The last couple of week have been mostly trying to maintain my progress and keep my red meat consumptions at a minimum. My consumption is still minimalist with only eating it if I am at a restaurant or have no other options to replace it. I still have a breakfast burrito in the morning, occasionally changing it with a fruit and yogurt parfait. My family has overall reduced our red meat intake, my dad and mom have gone back to eating salads every night instead of a regular dinner as I would eat.

I researched the effects of cattle farming on the soil beneath it. In most cattle farms the cattle will spend most of the day in a small fenced off area with possibly 100 other cows or more. The soil underneath loses all of soil structure and becomes very compact from the constant trampling. The soil is also positive for the secretions of the cattle, the high amounts of urine makes the soil toxic. Any water run off of the soil makes the water toxic as well, the soil is no longer viable for growth for at least a year of treatment. Some of this damage is unfixable and can permanently damage the soil.

http://www.agriculture.de/acms1/conf6/ws4lives.htm

Blog Post #1

Over that past few weeks have been watching what I eat and trying to reduce my red meat consumption. Over the weeks I have reduced my Red meat consumption by a considerable amount, I feel as if I am making a difference with what I’m doing. For breakfast I replaced beef sausage with ham bits, which will save about 2 packs of sausage a month. For lunch I they to how less of the meat which is given for lunch, for example instead of having 2 hamburger patties I only had one with more green beans and quinoa. For my post lunch snack before practice I had an omelet and toast, which is replacing a hamburger or sub sandwich. A steak dinner was replaced with a baked chicken and corn or beans, A beef hamburger was replaced with a turkey burger. This is reducing my red meat consumption by almost half.

Eggs, cheese, and turkey have a high carbon emission but it is still less than beef. Beef has a carbon emission of 27.0 kilos equivalent. Turkey has 10.9 kilos, chicken has 6.9 kilos, and eggs have 4.8 kilos. With cutting my beef consumption in almost half I have saved almost 814.5 kilos of carbon each month just in meat alone. I plan to continue this through the upcoming weeks.

http://www.greeneatz.com/foods-carbon-footprint.html

My Pledge

I pledge to limit my consumption of red meat which has a high emission of carbon and methane from the raising of cattle. I eat red meat or any other type of meat with about 3 of the 4 meals I have per day. I hope to reduce this to about 2 meals a day, lunch and dinner. I plan on accomplishing this by instead of having a burger I would maybe have a salad or a meat with less carbon emissions such as free range chicken or wild caught fish.  I also plan on keeping a journal of what I eat, this journal would include everything I eat for that meal.