Where does a predominantly grassland farm fit in with carbon credits

Jackov Altraids

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Devon
What about if the grassland management was improved, so that the steer finished at 660kg at 18 months, in their second season at grass?

The grassland management was improved for bio-diversity?
improved for flood mitigation?
improved as a specific habitat
improved as a carbon sequester
improved as a food producer

Pasture can do all of these things, often simultaneously.

The crux of the problem of the 'climate emergency' is that there are very few hard and fast rules.
Everything depends on the detail.
It is wrong to say meat is good or bad.
It is wrong to say intensive is worse than extensive.
It is wrong to assume that food miles are always bad.

The only thing that matters is whether the system is [in theory] capable of continuing ad infinitum. Then it really is sustainable.

Agriculture is probably the only industry actually capable of being sustainable.
 

Ffermer Bach

Member
Livestock Farmer
The grassland management was improved for bio-diversity?
improved for flood mitigation?
improved as a specific habitat
improved as a carbon sequester
improved as a food producer

Pasture can do all of these things, often simultaneously.

The crux of the problem of the 'climate emergency' is that there are very few hard and fast rules.
Everything depends on the detail.
It is wrong to say meat is good or bad.
It is wrong to say intensive is worse than extensive.
It is wrong to assume that food miles are always bad.

The only thing that matters is whether the system is [in theory] capable of continuing ad infinitum. Then it really is sustainable.

Agriculture is probably the only industry actually capable of being sustainable.
I hate to admit it, but from a sustainability point of view, there is a very good argument for importing a lot of our food, but from the food security view, there is a political imperative to keep a production capacity here in the UK, so if the wheels fall off the food production system (for example who would ever have thought Covid could happen as it has?) we can still feed ourselves. I think the big problem we have is, the difference between being sustainable or not is so subtle and complicated, organic and little cultivation, probably sustainable, non organic and direct drilling probably sustainable, organic or conventional and lots of ploughing more questionable, chickens good feed converters, but where does that feed come from? British milk uses far less Soya than European milk (as we grow such good grass) so we should not be importing milk products, the hills don't produce that much food, but they sequest lots of Carbon (unless grazing is really reduced as environmentalist want, without thinking of fire dangers too), so all very difficult and I think our politicians and civil service are completely out of their depth.
 

Kevtherev

Member
Location
Welshpool Powys
Joel worth a watch
D384C538-B5EE-4CA7-AEFE-FFAD951FC7F9.jpeg
 

digger64

Member
What about if the grassland management was improved, so that the steer finished at 660kg at 18 months, in their second season at grass?
depends on the relative carbon value of conserved forage or grain and all the machinery operations etc but needs more land so less kgs produced per ha do you look at carbon per head , per kg or per ha ?
 

farmerm

Member
Location
Shropshire
I suspect it would depend on how that grassland is managed. If it runs cattle indoors on zero grazed, high input Westerwolds then it will have a far higher carbon footprint than the same farm with reasonable output from a rotational grazing system, outwintering on cell grazed grass or forage crops, and with no bought in concentrates.

Every farming system will be different.

Should the farmer, and his family’s, lifestyle be taken into account of too? If they’re miserable buggers that never go anywhere and live on homegrown veg & meat, then their carbon footprint will be many times lower than a family that flies off on skiing holidays and races cars for a hobby….just as a random example.😂 I guess somewhere in the middle, will be a miserable bugger that doesn’t fly off on holiday, but keeps a fleet of Smokey old Fordsons to ride round in? @7610 super q @Clive
Ah but you miss the point entirely. With Gentle Farmings approach your farms carbon footprint is irrelevant, it’s only carbon sequestration that matters and usefully how long that carbon remains sequestered is also irrelevant :rolleyes:
 

Kiwi Pete

Member
Livestock Farmer
Question??
Depends entirely on management and inputs. Dog and stick, perm pasture.... not too bad.
Heaps of new grass and inputs... may as well grow grain and export every speck of what grew

We aren't too bad as we have reasonable "output" with very little input, a lot of grassland needs to be destocked at some point of the year or at least well rested / long rotations.
Once you try to grow grass "faster" then the inputs required completely negate any increase in photosynthesis, which is where it comes from.

Out of 100 units of SOC, between 70 and 80 come from your plants' photosynthesis pumping simple carbohydrate downwards, the balance is residues decomposing. This is why well managed grassland is streets ahead of forests of exotic species that don't form mycorrhizal associations, in the respect of Carbon storage.

Unfortunately, the best place in the world to grow good grassland, are also the places where "improvements" are made, which is a large problem because so few realise that their 30 day rotation + urea is taking them nowhere.
Their weeds are doing more work.
 

cows sh#t me to tears

Member
Livestock Farmer
Heres a novel thought. How bout they stick their carbon credits (and paying for them) where their emissions come ( up their own asses)from and clean up their own stinking mess, rather than being able to "offset" it and pollute away happily.
Obviously farming is a neutral exercise when it comes to carbon , or more importantly a "negative" one.
End goal is achieved much quicker if big business is forced to clean up their act. If that means no air travel then good, so be it.
 

holwellcourtfarm

Member
Livestock Farmer
depends on the relative carbon value of conserved forage or grain and all the machinery operations etc but needs more land so less kgs produced per ha do you look at carbon per head , per kg or per ha ?
But, again, it's an unfair comparison unless you restrict yourself to grassland on class 2 or 1 land. What's the carbon footprint of growing wheat on hill ground? Or on wet river meadows? That's where most UK grassland is, after all.

Also, shouldn't the QUALITY of the food come into it? Compare per kg of bioavailable protein and pasture raised meat would knock the socks off plant based foods. Excessive consumption of processed cereals and maize underpins much of our current health crisis.

None of this is obvious or easy.
 

Jackov Altraids

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Devon
But you've taken extremes. What about a 660 kg 15 month finished heifer against a 550 kg 19 month steer finished on just grass as some are doing?

How can you compare 660kg beast finished at 15 months on a feedlot using food waste near a food factory and a similar beast finished at 36 months on rough grazing that has enabled a rare species to thrive? They've both had a positive environmental impact.
 

holwellcourtfarm

Member
Livestock Farmer
How can you compare 660kg beast finished at 15 months on a feedlot using food waste near a food factory and a similar beast finished at 36 months on rough grazing that has enabled a rare species to thrive? They've both had a positive environmental impact.
Agreed. Almost everyone who does these comparisons has an agenda and so picks the criteria for their comparison to suit.

Carbon footprint comparisons are en vogue but we should really be doing comprehensive lifecycle assessments. Trouble is these are very complicated and so expensive.

Also, most of these assessments are done using models rather than real data. The assessment is only as accurate as the model which, generally, means not at all.
 

digger64

Member
But you've taken extremes. What about a 660 kg 15 month finished heifer against a 550 kg 19 month steer finished on just grass as some are doing?
I didnt mean to take extremes I know the first is what we do and the second is what I see go through the ring when I am occasionally there , but the good results quoted on grass whilst certainly possible on good grass /management/top quality silage etc I certainly dont see it on the elms/hls type scheme policys that appear to be the future (but I may have interpreted that wrongly ).
Growth rate and avoiding a second winter/feeding period in the key to both though , at the moment the more forage used the older the finished cattle are .
To take another extreme would running highland bullocks to 36 months on lots of acres of poor forage with some winter feeding be more carbon friendly to produce the the same amount of meat ?
 

farmerm

Member
Location
Shropshire
Heres a novel thought. How bout they stick their carbon credits (and paying for them) where their emissions come ( up their own asses)from and clean up their own stinking mess, rather than being able to "offset" it and pollute away happily.
Obviously farming is a neutral exercise when it comes to carbon , or more importantly a "negative" one.
End goal is achieved much quicker if big business is forced to clean up their act. If that means no air travel then good, so be it.
I think it is rather over optimistic to suggest even farming is carbon neutral! Most of us farm land that once held much more carbon in forest, scrub or perm pasture than is the case today. We all have our own direct fossil fuel contributions. Total soil organic matter on most farms has decreased in the past 40 years, faster still when farming high organic soils like the fens. Its disingenuous to say that the emissions from manufactures of our inputs have nothing to do with us. Even those few who really are carbon sinks, we need to offset the emissions from those upstream of our supply chain before we can offset emissions from any other. On average its 6kg of CO2 emitted for every 1kg Nitrogen produced, its about 2T C02 emissions for every 1T of steel and more still to turn that steel into agricultural equipment and parts
 

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