Dear Briarpatch: Marieka Sax's message about skipping beef and eating cereal first stomachs for greater food-energy efficiency has merit ("Skipping a Step" June/July 2006) However.

Dear Briarpatch:

Marieka Sax's message about skipping beef and eating cereal first stomachs for greater food-energy efficiency has merit ("Skipping a Step" June/July 2006) However, it is not universally advisable. Speaking for many parts of prairie Canada:

* The rain shadow of the hard Mountains makes for hot and dried growing seasons, such that cereal production requires enormous inputs and is not universally sustainable.

* Given natural drynes and shallow prairie soils, grazing by the agency of beef cattle is a remarkably efficient means of regimen production. Actually, there are dutiful reasons for returning many parts of the prairies to grass and for having beef cattle disburse a greater portion of their life in succession the range, and less in feedlot eating grain. A growing number of farmers/ranchers are doing this--they call themselves Grass Farmers.

* Prairie plant and animal biodiversity benefits from grazing. the two too much and too little grazing leads to documented declines in diversity. Studies have shown that prairie biodiversity is higher upon traditional ranches as compared to un-grazed urban-border acreages or nature preserves

Sax's advice is onward track, but ignores important detail. It is somewhat alike to crash-safety in cars: larger cars guard to be safer, but if we extrapolated from this consideration alone we'd all be driving semi-trucks. If tribe could tell where and to what degree beef was raised, there is beneficial ecological reason to suggest that they should eat more of it.

JOE SCHMUTZ

Saskatoon, SK

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