Feeding Cattle Seaweed Cuts Methane Significantly

UC Davis and other institutions have been experimenting with seaweed added to cattle feed to reduce methane emissions. Results are very encouraging, showing reductions in methane production from between 52% to over 90% in some cows with only 1-2 % of their feed replaced with seaweed.
Unfortunately, the best results come from strains that are notoriously difficult to grow, so the next step is developing aquaculture to farm enough to add it to cattle feed nation (and eventually world) wide.
Stormsingersays...

Honestly, that sounds way too good to be true. I'd love to see something about the metabolic pathways that explain how replacing such a small amount of feed could lead to 90% reduction in methane.

This screams for a LOT of replication (and explanation) before anyone gets too excited about it.

Interesting video, though.

newtboysays...

Red seaweed (e.g., Asparagopsis taxiformis) has been praised for inhibiting methane production from cattle by more than 80 percent because of its high bromoform content. trihalomethanes, such as bromoform decreases methane emissions from cattle belches.
Unfortunately, red seaweed is difficult to farm.

This particular video above is 4 years old, and seaweed supplements are now past the initial testing phase.

A few more recent articles I found include….

https://caes.ucdavis.edu/news/feeding-cattle-seaweed-reduces-their-greenhouse-gas-emissions-82-percent

https://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/592243-hold-off-for-now-on-feeding-seaweed-to-cows-to-reduce-methane/

Stormsingersaid:

Honestly, that sounds way too good to be true. I'd love to see something about the metabolic pathways that explain how replacing such a small amount of feed could lead to 90% reduction in methane.

This screams for a LOT of replication (and explanation) before anyone gets too excited about it.

Interesting video, though.

Phoozsays...

You know what also works to cut dairy cow methane emission? Not exploiting cows; breeding them to always produce milk, feeding them hormones to increase their milk production, and not stealing their babies away from them. That plus all the agriculture you feed them that you could instead feed to humans.

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