Eating a common animal to save many endangered ones?!
Cattle (cow sheep etc) in Australia are the cause of a lot of environmental damage and clearing of fragile ecosystems causing the extinctions of many species.
However there is currently a push to hunt kangaroos in marginal lands instead of grazing the areas. This would result in returning the area to its natural form and allow endangered species such as the bilby, to recover due to habitat expansion as well as the return of native vegetation.
Knowing this would any vegetarians/vegans be willing to eat kangaroo meat in the knowledge that each steak you eat is marginally improving the environment?
Answers: I just wanted to gauge some opinions of some vegetarians/vegans about this topic:
Cattle (cow sheep etc) in Australia are the cause of a lot of environmental damage and clearing of fragile ecosystems causing the extinctions of many species.
However there is currently a push to hunt kangaroos in marginal lands instead of grazing the areas. This would result in returning the area to its natural form and allow endangered species such as the bilby, to recover due to habitat expansion as well as the return of native vegetation.
Knowing this would any vegetarians/vegans be willing to eat kangaroo meat in the knowledge that each steak you eat is marginally improving the environment?
Calm down people!
I'm a vegetarian so i wouldn't it either way, but i see where you're coming from. I think people should concentrate more on conserving endangered species than saving some of the hundreds of thousands of cows and things.
But to be honest (for a vegetarian) if you phrase it like that its a lose/lose situation anyway, either let the environment slowly deteriorate or kill lots of animals just for our consumption.
I think maybe they should just stop mass producing livestock just for food and then maybe that would balance it out a little.
Why would they be willig to eat meat when it is the very same food source that they choose not to consume? Instead of asking if vegetarians would be willing to eat meat, why not ask the omnis to consume more kangaroo instead of beef and lamb/mutton?. Perhaps that would lessen the numbers in the "artificial" grazing herds (cattle and sheep)which in turn would lessen the size of grazing lands required that would/or might lead to less pressure on natural habitat. Cows and sheep are not native to Australia but I believe kangaroos are. If there is pessure on the land, it would be the vast cattle and sheep herds not the kangaroo. My own experience is that the more man interferes or tries to control nature, th more problems are likely to occure, if not suon, then in due time. But that's form from a purely conservation point of view, not economic. I would not know the impact of reducing the cattle and sheep herds will have on the Australian economy.
No, because while eating the kangaroo meat might encourage further culling (and thus allow rejuvenation of the site, as you have suggested), it would entirely diminish the integrity behind vegetarianism.
"A kingdom divided amongst itself, cannot stand" and all that jazz. I think corporations and various anti-veg organisations will use this in their arguments for meat consumption, and furthermore, dismiss any future opinions of the vege-culture.
Also, kangaroos are native to Australia; cattle are not. I see vegetarianism as a form of protest against societies methods of providing meat for food. (Land clearing and factory farming, in particular--both aimed at maximising production and profit at the expensive of the environment and ethics).
That's like me asking you to eat cane toads because of the damage to the Florida everglade area due to an infestation of them from their native australia. Doesn't make much sense does it?
I don't eat meat period. That includes Kangaroo and cane toads.
I feel that people are always trying to control mother nature...we kill the predators and the grazers multiply, we kill off the grazers and the predators multiply and make off with our babies. ;)
I have an uncle who works for the ministry and he firmly believes that the earth need humans to control the population of animals, if we don't, the diseases come and kill off the over populated species, so why not just kill them and eat them before it happens....For me, I would rather just not be a part of any of that.
What you are talking about is "smart carnivore".....like we should be eating local, buying our eggs and meats etc from local farms, make sure that the cows we are eating are happy cows, free range, this would change the way we eat, not eat as much meat because really, we don't need so much (as in every single meal, meat or eggs 3-4 times a day).
Anyway, I don't know what it would take to reverse the damage we've caused, but I wouldn't start eating cows to get rid of them, they should can and dry them and ship them to starving nations. There are states who kill off deer because they are destroying the fields, the cow food, so the kill the deer and dig a hole and bury them, why don't they just eat the deer?
(Sorry this is long, this stuff blows my mind)
No, it sounds like the Kangaroo has been marginalised by the expansion of cattle and sheep population.
The answer is clear, stop breeding cattle and sheep for commercial reasons and let populations control themselves.
If it wasn't for humans eating meat, the 'roos wouldn't be in this situation in the first place.
Vegetarians already abstain from grazing animals' flesh. So have already stopped contributing to the damage. How is killing kangaroos going to make it better?
This question doesn't make any sense.