There's More Where That Came From

If you were a sheep and you were in Australia and you'd been thinking about what would go with those nice plastic trousers you had heard that you were getting, I hate to disappoint you but you're not getting any pants. What? That's right. No pants. No pants for the sheep. The sheep will not wear pants. Now, that's really supposed to be more of a 'rule' and less of an 'announcement', but in this case, semi-sadly, it's an announcement. And it's straight from those Australian scientists who have abandoned plastic plants for sheep in favor of gas masks. Wait. What?

I do believe I'm a bit ahead of myself here. Allow me to retreat just a tad. See, if you believe a whole lot of scientists (and Al Gore) the Earth is gradually getting hotter. The globe, it is a-warmin'. Hence the term "global warming". (Have you seen Al Gore lately? He's undergone a bit of global expansion since his Veep days. He's packing enough insulation these days to keep his globe plenty warm.) Global warming is bad. Scientists (except the mad ones) are good. We're still not sure what Al Gore is. But the point is, the good scientists are trying to figure out what we can do about global warming and how to slow it down or stop it. In order to do so, they first have to look to the sources of what warms the earth. (Sources other than Al Gorge Gore.)

Greenhouse gases (presumedly the gases that turn the earth warmer and make it like a "greenhouse") are bad for the environment. Methane is a greenhouse gas. Methane is bad for the environment. Sheep emit methane from both ends. The question is how much methane do sheep release from their woolly little bodies? That will help determine if there is a particular breed of sheep that emits more methane than other breeds. It will also help determine if a sheep's diet influences their methane production. (See, I don't get that part. The sheep's diet is whatever is in the field. It's field food. They're field food feeders. Isn't grass just grass no matter how you chew it? It would be a lot easier if you knew which sheep were the ones going out for Indian food every other night, wouldn't it? I'm sure that would narrow down the culprits to a conspicuous group.)

Well since methane is a gas, you have to capture it. You can't just put it in your pocket and walk home with it (thank God). It needs a container. What scientists had been doing (because they're so scientific-y and all) it putting plastic plants on the sheep and measuring the exit emissions that way. Turns out however, "that only about 2 per cent of sheep methane emissions came from their rear." That according to a one Professor James Rowe as quoted by our mates down under at news.com.au. So instead they're just going to put a mask over the sheep's face and measure the methane that way (of course they are.) because, according to Professor Rowe, "Putting plastic trousers on sheep is much more difficult than holding a mask there for a minute or so." Yes. I should think so. Actually, putting ANY kind of clothing on a sheep, aside from being just plain wrong, would in fact be quite difficult.

You may or may not remember the poor cows who were having their methane measured and were being forced to sport these fancy tanks for a while there. Behold! Tank Cow!

Well, ain't that sporty? Naturally, after seeing the cow with his butt backpack there, I had visions of the poor sheep looking something like...Behold! My twisted vision of sheep having their methane measured:

(Yes, I know it's frightening. Just try being in my head for a little while. It's not always that pleasant!) But fortunately, the scientists are a little more balanced than I am (there's a sentence I never thought I'd say) and they had a better way of capturing that methane-y sheep breath in a way so that "The animal is not in any distress ... they don't really object to it." I'll be the judge of that...Behold!

Huh. Maybe he's right. That doesn't look too bad. (The sheep has a much better deal than the poor cow did.) It kind of looks like a breathalyzer for sheep. (I wonder if they'll have them walk a straight line when they're done.) The thing is that down in Australia, they have a lot of sheep and they have a lot of kangaroos. Turns out that kangaroos don't emit very much methane at all regardless of diet. Now, some schools of thought down there say that if people would just eat more kangaroo and less sheep, that they could reduce the number of sheep needed and increase the number of kangaroos needed. (I know how they would do one of those, but I'm not sure about the other. Kangaroo orgy, perhaps? I don't even want to think about it. All of those sexed up marsupials...hopping all over the place on top of each other....it would be madness!) The thing is, people don't want to eat kangaroo. The kangaroo meat that is available now? Yeah, most people that buy it feed it to their pets. Oh, yum! That'd be like if George W. told the US, "Less McDonald's, more ALPO!"

But if they can figure out how to cut the sheep's methane emissions, then it's a win-win all the way around. The earth is helped, kangaroo meat doesn't become dinnertime sustenance and the people can eat the sheep again. (Hmmm. OK, I guess it's not win-win for the sheep. They seem to kind of be getting screwed in the end here, but even if that's true, at least there won't be a lot of methane when it's happening!) And that's why the scientists are giving all of the sheep these little methane breathalyzer tests. It's probably a good thing, too. Professor Rowe doesn't seem to think that breeding kangaroos to take the place of sheep is all that feasible of an idea. "Have you tried to muster kangaroos?" he asked. I have not. However, judging from his tone, it wouldn't be a scenario all that far from the one that I described above. Not far all at.

I have no idea how they measure their Flask o' Flatulence when they've collected their sample, nor do I don't know what they do with it when they're done. I can only assume (and really, really hope) that both processes do not take place near an open flame.

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Forecast For Argentina: Wind

Good Lord, where to start this one?

From our brave friends across the pond at the Telegraph.uk, I bring you this headline, the wording of which I had absolutely NOTHING to do with! Ahem.....

Cow farts collected in plastic tank for global warming study

I'm sorry, they f-ing did WHAT?!?

Cow farts collected in pla....

Oh, knock it off! It was a rhetorical question, for cryin' out loud!

Apparently, a cow has a slow digestive system. A really slow digestive system. That makes the cow one of the key producers of methane. Methane is one of your more potent greenhouse gases. You don't hear about it all that often because people are usually too busy harping about carbon dioxide and the carbon footprint. These scientists are getting busy harping about methane and the methane fartprint. (I'm sorry. I couldn't resist.) And they probably should because methane can trap the heat in the atmosphere about 23 times more effectively than carbon dioxide. (But, as I'm sure you are aware, it's much more important, with more complex issues such as the global warming, that the focus be directed squarely in the middle of that which is not of the most importance. I don't know why that is, but I think it has something to do with idiots.)

So it would seem that the cow's slow digestive system causes it to, um, break wind. A lot. And that, in turn, produces a lot of methane. But the scientists want to know what the impact of the methane is on global warming (which may or may not be happening, depending on whom you ask and whether or not you're wearing a parka right now).

In order to determine the effect of the methane, they need to figure out how much methane they're dealing with. In order to do that, they have to figure out a way to capture it so that it can be measured. (If you're still with me after reading that sentence, you'll know what's next. Not really. There's no way you'll see this coming.) They have decided that this would best be accomplished by running a tube from a plastic tank attached to the back of a cow into one of their four stomachs where the methane originates. When the methane is expelled (ie, flatulated), instead of going into the air, it will be captured in the tank for the scientists to later do something very scientific-y to in order to calculate the amount of methane and what to do about it. Behold! A methane producing bovine with a plastic tank strapped to it's back in Argentina:


Ah, geez. Look at him. On behalf of all non-bovine methane emitters, we're sorry.

So far, researchers (I use the term loosely, for cryin' out loud, and they should too) in Argentina have learned that the methane produced by the cows accounted for more than 30 percent of all of the Argentinian greenhouse emissions. If that seems like a lot, it's because it is, especially when you consider that Argentina has approximately 55 million cows grazing about there. (The cows are especially fond of the "famed Pampas grasslands". Note to self: Avoid famed Pampas grasslands when visiting Argentina.)

According to Guillermo Berra, who is a researcher at the NIAT (National Institute of Agricultural Technology), each cow produces between 800 and 1,000 liters of "emissions" every day. (That's a lot of Mexican food.) Guillermo and his cohorts are working in tandem with some folks over at the NCSTI (National Council of Scientific and Technical Investigations), presumedly also in Argentina. The NCSTI guys are trying out new diets for the cows. They're trying to improve their digestion, I guess by speeding it up? It's not really all that clear, and I'm not feeling like I need to ask anyone either.

Silvia Valtorta of the NCSTI, says that if a cow has a diet which consists of clover and alfalfa instead of grain that the "methane emissions are reduced by 25 percent." So instead of emitting between 800 to 1,000 liters of, um, cow-wind per day, they're only going to emit between 600 and 750 liters of, um, cow-wind per day. Doesn't seem like a lot, does it? Ah, well, at least it's something. It had better be at least something if they're going to make the cows look like bovine booster rockets.

Even though there are over 55 million cows in Argentina, they're only strapping the plastic tanks onto about 10 of them. And although that's a really small sample number, it's somewhat comforting to know that only 10 will be sporting the bovine backpack. Oh, and some of those cows are in a corral and their methane is collected in yellow balloons that hang from the roof. Of course it is.

Where, oh where is Gary Larson when we need him?

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