Cows Save the Planet: And Other Improbable Ways of Restoring Soil to Heal the Earth Free PDF

Cows Save the Planet: And Other Improbable Ways of Restoring Soil to Heal the Earth [Paperback]

Author: Judith D. Schwartz | Language: English | ISBN: 1603584323 | Format: PDF, EPUB

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Cows Save the Planet: And Other Improbable Ways of Restoring Soil to Heal the Earth Free PDF
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In Cows Save the Planet, journalist Judith D. Schwartz looks at soil as a crucible for our many overlapping environmental, economic, and social crises. Schwartz reveals that for many of these problems—climate change, desertification, biodiversity loss, droughts, floods, wildfires, rural poverty, malnutrition, and obesity—there are positive, alternative scenarios to the degradation and devastation we face. In each case, our ability to turn these crises into opportunities depends on how we treat the soil.

Drawing on the work of thinkers and doers, renegade scientists and institutional whistleblowers from around the world, Schwartz challenges much of the conventional thinking about global warming and other problems. For example, land can suffer from undergrazing as well as overgrazing, since certain landscapes, such as grasslands, require the disturbance from livestock to thrive. Regarding climate, when we focus on carbon dioxide, we neglect the central role of water in soil—"green water"—in temperature regulation. And much of the carbon dioxide that burdens the atmosphere is not the result of fuel emissions, but from agriculture; returning carbon to the soil not only reduces carbon dioxide levels but also enhances soil fertility.

Cows Save the Planet is at once a primer on soil's pivotal role in our ecology and economy, a call to action, and an antidote to the despair that environmental news so often leaves us with.

Direct download links available for Cows Save the Planet: And Other Improbable Ways of Restoring Soil to Heal the Earth [Paperback] Free PDF

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Chelsea Green Publishing; 1 edition (May 20, 2013)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1603584323
• ISBN-13: 978-1603584326
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

The idea that animals such as cows might actually be good for not just the soil but for the grasses they feed on may seem a bit strange at first. But because grasses and grasslands (and pastures) have experienced millions of years of grazing animals they have not only learned to live with them but to thrive. Schwartz explains how this works and why healthy grasslands, farms and pastures can serve as carbon sinks while feeding the seven million plus people on the planet.

There is a crisis in food production and in fresh water availability that is upon us today. Soils are being depleted many times faster than they are being built, and water tables are falling precipitously. Schwartz interviewed people who demonstrate on their own farms that this doesn't have to continue. It was long thought (and before reading this book I believed it) that it typically took hundreds of years to build an inch or two of topsoil. However by using methods explained in this book farmers all over the world are building inches of topsoil in a year or less!

One technique is "pasture cropping." Essentially what you do is plant your seeds into an unplowed field that already has native grasses growing in it. The idea is that by keeping the field cover you retain the soil, the carbon in the soil, and the moisture while promoting and maintain a healthy soil ecology. Crops yields may fall a bit at first but over the long run you gain by keeping your fields covered all year round.

So what this book is about is soil rehabilitation. The stakes are huge. Healthy soil serves to sequester carbon and keep it out of the atmosphere. Healthy soil retains moisture and very significantly contains nutrients for not only healthy plant growth but for healthy foods for us.

Cows Save the Planet should be named Dirt. This is a well written book by a non-technical person about how critical soil (yes I called it dirt, sorry) is to life. In some ways, the conclusion is, fix soil and we will fix a lot of other problems in the world.

It took me a very long time to get engaged in this book. I have a science background and am always skeptical when somebody starts their book off by saying, I'm not an expert in this field but I've dedicated a lot of time to researching the topic. That is always a red flag for things going askew. Judith Schwartz is the exception to the rule.

What I like about this book, Schwartz took me through some very complicated concepts with the slow circling technique. She gradually brings a topic forward in an almost offhand way, then mentions somebody and writes about how interesting they are, some great story. She then gradually rolls in a complicated topic and before I knew it, I was agreeing with her. I was also thinking, how in the world could we be so silly to think that other thing would work? Schwartz is an accomplished author, the book is flawless.

The book is nicely balanced with just enough science that the average person would be challenged in a good way. And yet she didn't spend so much time on the science that the average person would get lost. She does not sensationalize any of the science, a la Mythbusters (which is entertaining, fun, and has its place; just not in a book about soil). I really like the fine line she has walked with this book. The book does not have references. I'm afraid all that would have bogged things down and been a severe burden at getting this book published - it isn't a scientific paper.

I enjoyed the matter of fact and balanced manner this book was presented.

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