Cows Save the Planet Summary

       Cows Save the Planet is a book by Judith D. Schwartz about how we can save our Earth from climate change.  The first thing that caught my eye about this book is the title.  It sounds humorous at first and you'd think it might be “clickbait”, but then you realize that it’s true, but not by themselves.  Judith also writes about other ways we can save the Earth from climate change like organic farming or cover crops and the facts and research about them.  The sub-title on this book is “and other improbable ways of restoring soil to heal the Earth” which means that most of these ideas are unlikely but possible.  Judith writes about how, in order to actually heal the Earth, we need to imitate the way Nature has been using carbon for millions of years.  Mob-grazing is one of those methods, and that is where the title comes in.  

       The book discusses that 97% of cows are kept in feedlots.  That is where they are kept in a small enclosure with dozens of cows and this really hurts the soil and adds methane “cow farts” to the atmosphere by the hundreds.  The remaining 3% mob-graze on open fields with plenty of space and very good soil.  If all cows were used to mob-graze, this would significantly reduce the amount of carbon in our atmosphere, but we would not have as many cows to eat.  Overall, this book was very interesting with lots of statistics about the climate and methods to reduce climate change. With more books and helpful messages like this that actually change the modern way of agriculture, we might be able to start healing the Earth, one cow at a time.

Fun Fact: The vitamin content in the average apple 80 years ago was five times more than the average apple now.

Prepared by Alan