Update on - Cows are browsers?

[Guest guest]

I went back and found the story where I first heard this statement.It was from this interview with Blume, which was aired in August '08 on NPR. Blume is the Executive Director of the International Institute for Ecological Agriculture and author of Alcohol Can Be A Gas!

This is where he mentioned that cattle were originally forest dwellers/browsers. You can read the whole interview here: http://www.permaculture.com/book_menu/489/356/587

But here's the snippet: Blume: " Cattle are natives of Southern Europe and Northern Africa and were forest dwellers. You take a look at them, you can see they have big wide feet, and what they like to eat is brush. So they're not actually evolved to eat grains. They're not grassland animals at all; they're browsers. "

Still, after listening again, I could not find any further information regarding the history of cattle that supported this. So I contacted the folks at the International Institute for Ecological Agriculture and asked them about it.

emailed me back, and he said I could share the email with you all, so here is what he said: " Hi

I am on the road so don't have any files available although I do cite

several in my book. Cattle evolved in the forest not on grasslands. Grass

is certainly closer to a natural diet than the seeds of grass i.e. corn

but a wide variety of brushy fare is the best. For instance if you want

higher butterfat content in milk as dairymen do, planting hedgerows of

filbert or butternut that cattle can rotationally graze upon will do

wonders for the fat numbers. Pasture based systems are best with a wide

variety of species of forbs and grasses than grasses alone and there lots

of data on that. You are probably already doing this. If you look up

silvaculture you'll find whole systems of using brushy species for

rotational grazing. No need to change everything you are now doing but

you might start to research various tough nitrogen fixing shrubs that can

take browsing like Tagasate etc. to vary and diversify your animal's diet

on some of their rotations. " I have not yet read the book, but I will let you know what I learn.I was pleased with his suggestions and will look into it further. However, I am a bit concerned about his advocating ethanol production by-product as feed - a practice I know most of you are not likely to embrace.

Now I need to learn more about the effort of using alcohol distillation by-product feeds on cattle - it's historical use and how that differs from what he is suggesting. ~