Cow Poop, Pros and Cons

Are cows good or bad for the environment? 

This article opens with the fact that 18% (I've read 14% other places) of man made green house emissions can be blamed on livestock and goes on to argue that grass fed pasture rotated cattle can be good if not beneficial, in moderation. 

How exactly to cows emit green house gases? They Burp, and fart, but I guess mostly it is the burps that do it. Read about that here!

"To understand why cows produce methane, it's important to know a bit more about how they work. Cows, goats, sheep and several other animals belong to a class of animals called ruminants. Ruminants have four stomachs and digest their food in their stomachs instead of in their intestines, as humans do. Ruminants eat food, regurgitate it as cud and eat it again. The stomachs are filled with bacteria that aid in digestion, but also produce methane." 

Our article concludes with: "When cattle are rotated from pasture to pasture they eat a portion of the grass, spurring new growth which results in more net biomass. Cows then fertilize the land by trampling manure and decaying organic materials into the soil."

" According to a twelve year USDA study of ways to improve soil quality, published in the Soil Science Society of America Journal (2010), moderately grazed areas actually have more stored carbon in the soil, both increasing fertility and slowing global warming."