• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Rancher feeds his cows candy due to high corn prices

Status
Not open for further replies.

Parch

Member
No drought in western Canada. It's been a wet summer.
We'll trade you a truck full of corn for a truck full of money.
 
so he's feeding his cattle subsidized corn syrup, now that's a plan!

tumblr_m3knfjCvbm1rvvhfvo1_400.gif



The US has a huge surplus of corn so it's ultra cheap.

Well, not anymore!
 
I learned via a comedy show on NPR this past weekend (wait wait don't tell me) that Forrest Mars, son of the founder of the the Mars company, fed defective M&Ms to his pigs.

The more you know.™
 

fritolay

Member
I love how everyone keeps denying it.. whatever it is... and we are all faced with record heat, droughts, crop failure, skyrocketing food prices...

like everyone said would happen, due to climate change..

This generation failed.

idiocracy.jpg

Do some more research on previous droughts, just in the US alone. It helped migrate people west by the way. (FYI - It was before cars and industry)
 

marrec

Banned
Wait...

Doesn't most candy contain High Fructose Corn Syrup?

By 'second hand candy' he must mean old Halloween stuff.
 

fritolay

Member
1/3 the US corn crops are now used in ethanol. To sustain the growth of corn consumption, corn crop output will have to double in the (x forgot how many I know that is important) many of years.

We have companies importing corn right now from Brazil, as it is cheaper than buying local in the US.
 

marrec

Banned
1/3 the US corn crops are now used in ethanol. To sustain the growth of corn consumption, corn crop output will have to double in the (x forgot how many I know that is important) many of years.

We have companies importing corn right now from Brazil, as it is cheaper than buying local in the US.

I... think I'm going to need a citation on that.
 

Askani

Member
I've always wondered why they don't feed them grass clippings. I mean we throw the shit away

You don't want to feed cattle chemically treated grass clippings. You have to make sure where is comes from and it doesn't have any chemicals or pesticides or any of the other shit rich people put on their lawns.

Also, it's going to "rot" rather quickly. So you have to immediately get it from yards to cows.
 
D

Deleted member 17706

Unconfirmed Member
Well the candy is probably made mostly from corn syrup.
 
You don't want to feed cattle chemically treated grass clippings. You have to make sure where is comes from and it doesn't have any chemicals or pesticides or any of the other shit rich people put on their lawns.

they eat corn...probably some pesticides in that too
 

fritolay

Member
Some companies that provide ingredients for dog food companies, they may reject them and those same ingredients some human food companies accept. This is true too.
 

Rookje

Member
yo sorry dude, but if everyone actualy stopped eating meat then world hunger, climate change/warming, deforestation, methane exhaustion and many more aspects that influence the globe negatively would be much less pronounced.

educate yourself, pls
Not really.
 

Wazzim

Banned
The whole bio industry is full of shit, so many lost resources just because people want to eat ridiculous amounts of meat.
 

fritolay

Member
Like what?

Many things, moisture percentages, bacteria/mold/yeast, just depends on the product and ingredient. The point is some pet products have more stringent requirements than some people food. Pet food is FDA regulated as well.

On the 1/3rd part.

Whatever, I don't care if some rancher is feeding his cows candy because our congress in inept!

Wait no I do care.

1/3 of corn is used today in ethanol, meaning as of this past year. I did a quick Google search, and this article says "The USDA on Aug. 10 predicted ethanol use in the year starting Sept. 1 would consume 4.5 billion bushels, down from 5 billion in the current year. Use for ethanol as a share of the estimated crop would rise to 42 percent from 40 percent.". So if I read that right then it is more than 1/3 now.

Ethanol is not something they can send through pipelines. It is shipped by truck for example, burning more oil and gasoline. There are many many things that they say make it one of the least efficient forms of fuel, and at a cost to the world food supply.

The problem is, that the US Govt mandated this so it would make us rely less on foreign oil. Now if you were to back out of this would impact our farmers as well.

The average farmer in Iowa could not feed his family. The corn is crap, made for corn syrup.

Corn syrup is used in almost EVERYTHING. That is why food prices are going to go up quite a bit now.
 

marrec

Banned
Many things, moisture percentages, bacteria/mold/yeast, just depends on the product and ingredient. The point is some pet products have more stringent requirements than some people food. Pet food is FDA regulated as well.



1/3 of corn is used today in ethanol, meaning as of this past year. I did a quick Google search, and this article says "The USDA on Aug. 10 predicted ethanol use in the year starting Sept. 1 would consume 4.5 billion bushels, down from 5 billion in the current year. Use for ethanol as a share of the estimated crop would rise to 42 percent from 40 percent.". So if I read that right then it is more than 1/3 now.

Ethanol is not something they can send through pipelines. It is shipped by truck for example, burning more oil and gasoline. There are many many things that they say make it one of the least efficient forms of fuel, and at a cost to the world food supply.

The problem is, that the US Govt mandated this so it would make us rely less on foreign oil. Now if you were to back out of this would impact our farmers as well.

The average farmer in Iowa could not feed his family. The corn is crap, made for corn syrup.

Corn syrup is used in almost EVERYTHING. That is why food prices are going to go up quite a bit now.

I'm down with less ethanol production if the situation calls for it. As a fuel it's use is limited by our infrastructure as you've pointed out. A lot of that ethanol that's produce is export though correct? I wonder if ethanol exports count toward overall corn exports...
 

fritolay

Member
I'm down with less ethanol production if the situation calls for it. As a fuel it's use is limited by our infrastructure as you've pointed out. A lot of that ethanol that's produce is export though correct? I wonder if ethanol exports count toward overall corn exports...

I would not think they would be in the same category, the exports are different categories. However who knows how the numbers are figured in some of the reports.

It makes you wonder, if the Middle East can say "hah we have the oil you need", the US then says "hah we have the food everyone needs, and we will use some for oil". The world wants oil production regulations and such, what if other countries wanted to regulate US corn and food production. Hmmm.
 

fritolay

Member
First post wins,

But seriously what the fuck are we eating nowadays.....

This is very true.

More and more of the food industry is commercialized vs the a family owned farm. With the commercialization, you have capitalism, companies competing, stock holders, etc. The bottom line and success of the company is goal number 1.

If company A, B, and C raise beef cattle. Company A starts putting cows in small confinements, like chickens, and instead of grazing they pump them full of corn, they get fatter and sell for more money. Then company B says hey, they are making more money off less investment, and their buying more cattle and land, and their stock is higher, we must do that. If they don't, their share holders do.

Now you have large company's with fields crammed full of fat corn fed cows, and whatever other crap they can get cheap. Company C holds out, but for how long? Their cows they don't make as much money. People get fired, upper management is replaced with people that WILL make the company competitive, which is doing what company A and B do.

Now when cows are kept in close quarters, standing in their own crap, and getting fat, how do they keep them from getting sick? Pump them full of antibiotics.

Now what does this mean? Well people laugh and make jokes, people in the US eat crap and get fat. This is true. However if people today were to try and eat the same as their parents did in the US, guess what? The food is not as healthy for you, it has more fat. That T-Bone steak? Well you it was corn fed to make the cattle fat, and now you are eating fatter meat. Today the food is less healthy because of the cattle food industry. This is what many people don't understand.

People think anyone that wants "natural" or "grazing fed cows" are hippies and such. There actually is more to it than that.

I asked a US friend, who has small farm, do you feed your cows a bunch of corn? He said "hell yeah, I pump them full of that shite and send them to market".

I recommend this documentary from 2007 - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1112115/ King Corn

King_corn.jpg


corn.jpg
 

saunderez

Member
1/3 the US corn crops are now used in ethanol. To sustain the growth of corn consumption, corn crop output will have to double in the (x forgot how many I know that is important) many of years.

We have companies importing corn right now from Brazil, as it is cheaper than buying local in the US.

So stupid making ethanol from corn when there are sources of it that aren't an important food crop. For instance ethanol can be fermented from molasses which is a byproduct of the cane sugar production process (used to make rum typically). Hell even bagasse (a cellulosic byproduct of the sugar production process) can be used to make ethanol. Corn is terribly inefficient for it and wastes a good food crop.
 

fritolay

Member
Also McDonald's famous fries used to use beef fat. Hindu's didn't like that so much when they found out and sued them for not disclosing this fact.
 
Many things, moisture percentages, bacteria/mold/yeast, just depends on the product and ingredient. The point is some pet products have more stringent requirements than some people food. Pet food is FDA regulated as well.



1/3 of corn is used today in ethanol, meaning as of this past year. I did a quick Google search, and this article says "The USDA on Aug. 10 predicted ethanol use in the year starting Sept. 1 would consume 4.5 billion bushels, down from 5 billion in the current year. Use for ethanol as a share of the estimated crop would rise to 42 percent from 40 percent.". So if I read that right then it is more than 1/3 now.

Ethanol is not something they can send through pipelines. It is shipped by truck for example, burning more oil and gasoline. There are many many things that they say make it one of the least efficient forms of fuel, and at a cost to the world food supply.

The problem is, that the US Govt mandated this so it would make us rely less on foreign oil. Now if you were to back out of this would impact our farmers as well.

The average farmer in Iowa could not feed his family. The corn is crap, made for corn syrup.

Corn syrup is used in almost EVERYTHING. That is why food prices are going to go up quite a bit now.

"Switchgrass? What's that?"

Love the name, too. :p
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top Bottom