News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on Majority of America's underground water stores are drying up, study finds. Parent comment

Re:Majority of America's underground water stores are drying... by Solvency on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @05:25PM (#39123415)
Do you realize that the US native buffalo population used to be as high as 30 to 60 million before we decimated them?

30 to 60. million. grazers. Roaming the countryside, eating and pooping and fertilizing our soil. Remember when the US had some of the most fertile, nutrient-rich soil in the entire world? Remember how perfectly balanced our ecosystem was before we ruined it?

The issue is not ruminants. It's everything else we've done to this planet throwing everything life carefully manicured into disarray.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Majority of America's underground water stores are drying... by darth_avocado on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @05:49PM (#39123693)
We eat about 40 million cows and 125 million pigs every year, and more than 8 Billion chicken. These are just the ones that are killed each year, the actual livestock inventory is much higher for cows, around 90 million cows. We absolutely will have to cut back production if we want to "sustainably" farm cattle.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Majority of America's underground water stores are drying... by nullhole on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @05:31PM (#39123486)
On the plus side there are a lot more people who get to be alive now.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Majority of America's underground water stores are drying... by Faaak on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @05:47PM (#39123663)
there are ~90M cattle in the US, so more than before ?
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Majority of America's underground water stores are drying... by justinclift on Wednesday January 24, 2024 @06:00PM (#39123811)
Wonder much the average buffalo consumes vs the average cow?

It's probably relevant in order to provide some kind of scaling factor. :)

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Majority of America's underground water stores are drying... by alan-hn on Thursday January 25, 2024 @09:46AM (#39130088)
Probably more, considering they're likely similar mass but migrate more than cows do who are usually relatively confined
[ Parent | on HN ]