I don't know if this is really /sci/ territory, but I cannot

Maybe the people in the animal board, whe should have a farming board though.

>>7757417
ha
You don't need a science answer, you need a pop-Sci answer to win your debates on /pol/ or at the dinner table with your dense ass family

>>7757417
Yes but I have no citations. There are areas in the middle East and Africa that aren't suitable for crops but can sustain livestock of some varieties. I think there may be some similar areas in the western US too but I'm not sure.

>>7757417
>Surely there are situations in which the ground is too poor to sustain plants like wheat, beans, vegetables, etc., but would support grasses that grazers eat?
you dont even need grass. just feed them industrial mush that they get fed in mass animal factories.

I doubt it. I've always thought that plants were the most efficient, followed by plant eating animals, then animal eating animals.
Plants are the best when it comes to being efficient, that's why there is so much more plant life than animals.

As long as there is ample food supply, insects may be the most efficient way to produce food globally, one minus is that they're disgusting to consider eating even if they are delicious and no-one in rich countries would do so.

>>7757417
Midwest. The American Midwest does not get much rain, so to invest in water would be a reasonable cost. Grass is native to this area, so water is only needed for the animals themselves.

>>7757508
in my school, we are supplementing semolina pasta with insect flour (dehydrated crushed up crickets) in order to raise the protein content (introducing higher quality proteins) for use in countries with nutritional deficiencies

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>>7757417
farmer here,

a combination of crops and livestock is always more efficient than just crops. reason being that for example cattle eat a lot of plant material that humans cant digest.

If you are planting corn, you harvest the cob, then let cattle/sheep graze in the field to utilize the stems and leaves, they in turn also fertilize the ground so you need less fertilizer the next year. You can also plant other crops in the same field as corn which do not lower the corn yield, yet gives more plant material after a cycle that the cattle can graze on.

Cattle also utilize a lot of things humans wont want to eat, like chicken shit.

Lastly, it depends on what you mean by 'utilize better'. Do you mean just in terms of calories produced? or are you also looking at other content?, if so then some animals would be able to produce higher quality protien or other nutrients than any crop could produce on that same land, even if the total calories are reduced. a patch of land where no fruit trees can grow can still produce enough grass to carry some cattle, which are much more nutrient dense than grass to humans.

>>7757657
another thing, animals can live on terrain where you cant get in with tractors (to rocky, hills, too wet) , so either you need to do at the work with people by hand, or let the animals do all the work for you

>utilize some area of land better than a crop?
>better

Try rewording your question to something that is actually quantifiable.

>falling for the vegan troll

>>7757417
raising eatable bugs

>>7757417
Crop rotation dumb ass.

>>7757657
That's cool.

>>7757566
Why crickets? The are smelly, dirty, and difficult to contain. Why not dubia roaches?

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>>7757417
>Is there a situation in which raising animals, be it cattle, pork, poultry, fish, or insects, would utilize some area of land better than a crop?

Sure, in a desert. Use roach farming. It utilizes a ton of space that doesn't require tons of lighting. An entire skyscraper could be filled to the brim with a massive roach farm and create a megaton of food annually.

However, I do not have the numbers to properly make a comparison. If you look up this,

http://weburbanist.com/2015/01/11/worlds-largest-indoor-farm-is-100-times-more-productive/

There's a chance this type of lettuce farming could produce more food by weight than a cockroach farm. However, nutrient density is also a concern. A lettuce farm and roach farm would be best paired together. Neither need to use local soils or environment to work.

>Surely there are situations in which the ground is too poor to sustain plants like wheat, beans, vegetables, etc., but would support grasses that grazers eat?

If the ground is too poor to support those vegetables, it won't be as good for grasses either. Due to this, the grazing animals would need to travels 100s of miles a year to graze enough food to support themselves (exactly what happens in grasslands naturally.) Which is not a very good method for farming due to the land amount needed. You can make your own soil very easily through composting and amendment. The best solution is coupling vegetable farming with animal farming. You'll be able to build up a nice biome in any location doing this.

I'm a raised bed farmer. All the soil I use was made from compost and manure. The soil in my area had a very high clay content. Vegetables do very poorly in it. Even grasses do poorly though most people don't realize it. When I allow grasses to take over a fallow raised bed their growth is absolutely insane when compared to the grass grown in the local soil.

>>7757429
>whe should have a farming board though.

Agreed 100%.

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>>7757931
Continued.

The local cattle farmers here truck in manure, from their slurry caches and their biomethane waste, to put on their pasture lands. After several years of grazing and building up the soil the grass pastures become a great deal better. At that point they can be used for growing grain. All without the need for outside commercial fertilizers.

>>7757924
>The are smelly, dirty, and difficult to contain.

This is like calling snakes, "slimy". I mean how clueless do you have to be? lol

>>7757453
What is cattle farming.

Correct.

Shitty Food is Better Than Starving To Death for $600


Srsly though, Camel meat tastes like Ass. Scratch that, Horse Mule and Donkey meat taste like nourishment of the Gods in comparison. Therefore Camel meat tastes (much) worse than ass.

Source: Two years in the gulf

>>7757934
Crickets shit everywhere and their shit is like glue, it takes a lot more than a quick spray down to get it off of things. They also smell a lot worse than other insects, if you've ever spent time with them. Unless you get a variety that cant jump, there will always be escapes.

Fairly sure you've never actually owned crickets. Ask anyone who keeps reptiles about crickets. Dubias are vastly better about everything I mentioned and have higher nutrient to chitin ratio.

Crickets are an easy first choice but there are better choices to make and a good place to look is the herp community who has been raising bugs for food for decades.

Does anyone have any suggestions about useful grazing animals and their preferred environments?

For example: if you have woods on your property, get some goats to clear out the underbrush and then raise pigs in the woods.

What other animals do well inna woods?

>>7757417
Most people agree that, in general, animals are more energy intensive to support than plants.

Others have raised valid points though that if the land available to you is not optimal for domesticated plant growth, such as a place that is uncultivated wilderness and/or mountainous, then it can be easier (less capital-intensive) to support animals. Nomadic herdsmen can do this, or ranches that support more wild animals such as bison or deer for the purposes of hunting for meat once they're mature enough, but it would still require more land than a decent patch of good soil in most cases. If good, easily accessed soil is available plants are still superior.
Also, you mentioned insects. There are cricket breeders that don't need a lot of space to grow. They're also very nutritious, some have suggested this as an alternative to other meats. I'm not sure about fish farms, they depend on the fish being grown. Sometimes a small pond will do, sometimes they need to be caged in a larger body of water, either way this may also be efficient, but there are parasite risks and other concerns that can compromise the whole area.

It's a complex question where you need to compare it on a case-by-case basis. Such as specific animal(s) vs. specific plant(s) and their efficiency on a specific type of land.

>>7757953
I used to raise them for sale for herps and fishing bait. Their diet is what controls their feces consistency. If your crickets are shitting liquid or goo then they are unhealthy and need their diet changed.

Roaches are just as bad in all respects or odor and feces if they have a bad diet. The odor problem for both is ammonia. I'm the one that recommended roaches in the first place here >>7757931

>>7757417
>Is there a situation in which raising animals, be it cattle, pork, poultry, fish, or insects, would utilize some area of land better than a crop?
The situation where you are producing meat. No amount of crop will get you that.

Meat is a method of preserving energy not increasing it.

You can eat your cattle in the winter but you can't eat your grain (at least not with modern preservation methods).

>>7758101
>You can eat your cattle in the winter but you can't eat your grain (at least not with modern preservation methods).

What are you talking about? Grain lasts for years just sitting in a cool dry location. Explain further.