Climate Change – The Kangaroo Solution (Part 2)

PART 2 OF 2

The Australian Coat Of Arms

In yesterday’s post I mentioned how the Australian Government’s expert economist who produced a white paper into the effects of Climate Change and how to combat it has suggested that we switch from a beef and lamb diet to one containing more kangaroo, to lessen the effects of the production of Methane Greenhouse Gas, which is 21 times more volatile than Carbon Dioxide. Grazing herd animals used for meat, cattle foremost among them, produce 18 percent of the World’s total Greenhouse gas, and most of this is that volatile Methane. Kangaroos produce almost negligible amounts of methane, so by converting our diets away from beef, then effectively we are preserving the environment.

Let’s pretend we actually begin to believe this anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions thing to the extent that some of the more vocal supporters suggest, then something this ridiculous is just so far out there, that it’s no wonder those who don’t support it pass it off so lightly. Next they’ll be telling us we need to conserve our breathing as the CO2 we all expire is contributing to Greenhouse Gas Global Warming, sorry, Climate Change.

So then, let’s look at this kangaroo thing, something unique to only Australia. We have some fairly unique animals here in Australia, and because they have a cute and cuddly appearance, then any feeling about them is always that they are a ‘nice’ animal, and so we need to be preserving them, rather than actually using them as a food source. This is a matter sometimes charged with emotion, as it’s one of the animals on the Australian coat of arms shown in the image above, the other animal being the flightless bird, the Emu, also only found in Australia. The name kangaroo stems from the original settlement of Australia. One of the white settlers, upon seeing one of these marsupials asked in English of one of the Australian indigenous Aborigines what the animal was. The Aborigine replied ‘kangaroo’, and that is how the animal got its name. Much later, when the language thing was sort of worked out, the word ‘kangaroo’ was translated from that local dialect as being ‘I don’t understand’.

People from nearly all overseas countries have one aim when visiting Australia as a tourist, and that is to see kangaroos and koalas, and please do not refer to them as koala bears as they are in no way related to any bear at all.

As to kangaroos, people would be surprised just how prevalent they really are. Not to the point that they roam the streets of any of our towns or cities but they are present in vast numbers. Some of the smaller species might be slowly becoming less, but the larger species are there in numbers.

You can drive the major highways of Australia, and in most areas outside of the major cities, you would be hard pressed to drive 5 miles without seeing a carcass beside the road, as they are the most impacted animal on our roads, and they cause huge amounts of damage to cars, as most Insurance Companies would attest to.

I have played golf on two courses where you actually share the course with kangaroos at certain times of the day, and they are so docile that you can walk up to your ball, set up and play the next shot while barely feet away, a kangaroo will just continue grazing, nonchalantly not even moving. I live in a fairly urban environment, and I can drive not ten miles form here and watch a mob grazing, the word ‘mob’ used to describe a collective number of kangaroos, like a herd of cattle. A couple of years back, my good lady wife and I visited a large sanctuary fifteen miles away in the heart of the Gold Coast, what is now the seventh largest city in Australia. There the public can roam around the thousands of acres of open land and see all nature of Australian wildlife. Some of the animals are enclosed in large areas as they are still quite wild, like the Tasmanian Devil with its bright red ears, and an absolutely huge bird enclosure, with more than a hundred species of birds. All this in the middle of an urban environment. We had some sandwiches for lunch in one of the huge open spaces, sitting on a park bench while kangaroos and wallabies grazed peacefully not feet away.

This first link is a general interest site from the Australian Government and gives a general overview. It explains that kangaroos can vary in size from some of the small species around one pound right up to the ‘Big Red’ which can weigh up to 200 pounds and stand seven feet tall. There are approximately 60 species and overall total numbers of all of them varies but estimates can go as high as 55 million animals.

Some points from this link are:

Kangaroos have long been important to the survival of Australia’s Indigenous peoples, who have hunted kangaroos for tens of thousands of years for both the meat and the skins. When Europeans arrived in Australia in the late eighteenth century, they too hunted kangaroos for survival.

The four species of kangaroo that are commercially harvested have very large populations. None is threatened or endangered. The Red kangaroo, Eastern grey kangaroo and Western grey kangaroo are the most abundant species and make up over 90 per cent of the commercial harvest. Their combined population size has fluctuated between 15 and 50 million animals over the past 25 years in the harvested areas, depending on seasonal conditions.

The Australian kangaroo industry estimates that it exports kangaroo meat to more than 55 countries. Kangaroo meat is increasingly popular and export markets are expected to increase since kangaroo is considered one of the finest game meats. Its growing appeal stems from its well-flavoured, slightly gamey taste. Kangaroo meat contains very little saturated fat relative to other meats and is high in protein, zinc and iron.

This next link shows approximate populations of the four species which are approved for commercial harvesting. it shows that the in the 4 States where harvesting is permitted, approximate totals of just these four is close to 24 million, almost the same size as the total beef herd numbers for all Australia. The most humane way of killing the animal is a shot to the head, and licensed hunters operate in these designated areas, mostly at night, shooting high powered rifles with the aid of a spotlight. Some of the hunters can take dozens each night.

This next link just details the number of the two largest kangaroo species approved for harvest in the Western Plains area of the State of New South Wales, showing average populations over the last three years. Just these two species alone add up to 6 Million, in this area alone, an area equivalent in size to the State of Oklahoma.

In March of this year the Australian ABC TV network aired a piece on its ‘Landline’ program, a one hour program for the man on the land that deals with mainly farming and grazing matters.

This specific piece actually dealt with the possibility of moving into the kangaroo farming business.

I won’t load up the video here because of the copyright restrictions, but it is easy enough for those of you who do wish to view it to get to. Just follow these instructions.

This is the link to the text of the piece, and the video is on the right and will play in most versions of computer video players. After taking the link you’ll see an image of the head of a kangaroo. Just under that is the title ‘Video’. Just select the player you have and the video will play. Besides dealing with the farming of kangaroos, it also gives some insight into Australian conditions, easily seen as you view the video. It runs for just a tick over 14 minutes and offers some insight into how something like this might be achieved.

So, please be aware that we are not condoning the wholesale slaughter of a cute and cuddly furry animal, but the management of a burgeoning food market of a marsupial that has been eaten here in Australia by the indigenous people for nigh on tens of thousands of years, as one of the only sources of meat that they had.

They are about as endangered as cattle are, and as iconic as they might seem, there is a place for them on ever increasing numbers of tables, as people find a way to include them in their diet, but not as a solution to Climate Change.

Tagged: Climate Change, Global Warming, Kangaroo

Posted in: Australia, Climate Alarmists, Environment, Global Warming, Junk Science, Videos