Allan Savory: How to green the world's deserts and reverse climate change

[Quixote1818]

Last edited Sat Jul 4, 2015, 05:32 PM - Edit history (4)

Edit: After I posted this video I did a bit more research. Trying to be careful about taking sides at this point because I don't know enough about this type of science but here are opposing views on this that I just came across and they bring up some good points about problems with Savory's research.

http://www.inexactchange.org/blog/2013/03/11/cows-against-climate-change/

http://www.slate.com/articles/life/food/2013/04/allan_savory_s_ted_talk_is_wrong_and_the_benefits_of_holistic_grazing_have.2.html


One thing I do know is that the most healthy ecosystems like the Great Plains had millions of buffalo that moved around. As for the photos in his video however, I have seen desert look completely barren one year with little rain and have no plant life, then the next year if there is a lot of rain, have all kinds of plants sprout up and cover the land, so you have to take his photos with a grain of salt. Also, as the Slate article points out, some deserts are just that, desert and never had grazing animals on them before. Introducing a grazing animal onto land that has a healthy ecosystem is only going to screw things up.

[HassleCat]

1. Grain of salt

As I understand Savory's plan, we would end with much more grassland, but a great deal of that grassland would be grazed by cows. The key would be to maintain the optimal ratio of grass to grazers. For a cue to how this could go wrong please refer to "Tragedy of the Commons," by Garrett Hardin.

[BillZBubb]

6. He discussed maintaining the proper scheduling and herd size

There is no "Tragedy of the Commons" possible here. All the participants understand that herd size is controlled as are grazing activities.

[Ernest Partridge]

9. Hardin Redux

And for how this "wrong" could go right, read "The Tragedy of the Commons" again, carefully.

As Hardin points out, the solution to the tragedy is intelligent management, or as he puts it "mutual coercion mutually agreed upon."

I prefer to call this "the moral point of view" -- rather than the point of view of each individual herdsman, view the land resource from perspective of all those who use the resource. Then establish and enforce rules that benefit all.

Aldo Leopold called this "thinking like a mountain" or, in this case, "thinking like the grassland."

For more, see: http://gadfly.igc.org/progressive/good-each.htm,
and http://gadfly.igc.org/progressive/moral.htm

Ernest Partridge
The Online Gadfly

[NorthCarolina]

2. Interesting video.

The only thing I wonder about is the methane created by these massive grazing herds. Is the "greening" sufficient to handle that as well?

There is no denying his success in reclaiming essentially desert land. The results were stunning.

[Quixote1818]

3. He mentions in the video that this type of soil breaks down methane and stores carbon

Go to the 12:30 mark of the video.

[NorthCarolina]

5. OK

thanks, guess I missed that part. There's no denying the fantastic results, that's for sure. Excellent video, thanks again!

[Quixote1818]

7. On the other hand, it doesn't hurt to be skeptical. Just found this

http://www.inexactchange.org/blog/2013/03/11/cows-against-climate-change/


Hard to say who to believe. I just know that there use to be millions of buffalo on the great plains and they were healthy. As long as grass is not overgrazed it would seem to make sense that animals adding fertilizer to the soil and packing down the grass to preserve moisture would make sense as long as you don't overgraze.

[NorthCarolina]

8. Perhaps cows

fitted with afterburners is the answer.

[DhhD]

11. Herds were separate and were nomadic, moving hundreds of miles south in winter and north in summer.

Grass on the plains is a wetland also so there was water. The aquifers were near the top and filled low spots or playa lakes of the Great Plains.

[think]

4. That was astonishing to learn how he's dealing with climate change. Thank you for posting.

I hope he can get countries to increase these efforts so that we may reduce the current climate change that is occurring and start controlling the scary process of desertification.

I don't doubt it will take efforts on many fronts like finding ways to end the use of fossil fuels to make significant change but this does look like a very smart way to start.

Thanks again for posting.

[passiveporcupine]

10. from the Slate link

Last edited Sat Jul 4, 2015, 08:14 PM - Edit history (3)

Whereas Savory asserts that the concentrated pounding of cow hooves will increase the soil’s ability to absorb water, North American studies, according to the authors, “have been quite consistent in showing that hoof action from having a large number of animals on a small area for short time periods reduced rather than increased filtration.”

Anyone who has ever gardened, and/or had livestock, or even those who have septic tank drain fields, they know this is not true. Compacting soil makes it less absorbent. Fertilizing (naturally,not with chemicals) makes it more absorbent.

I haven't seen his Ted talk yet...going to watch it now, but this alone makes me wonder where he is coming from.

Another thing. Look at the desertification map he shows at the beginning of the TED talk. Then go look at the US on Google Maps, in satellite mode. You will see a lot more green in the US than his map shows. I wonder where he got that image.

[Quixote1818]

12. Agree

I was really taken with the video until I looked into it more. But one part had me skeptical right from the beginning. I live in New Mexico and know exactly where two of his comparative photos were taken. The photos were from the Jornada Experimental Range in NM http://jornada.nmsu.edu/ and they also allow a lot of cattle on parts of that land and of course in the desert around there depending on what part of the range you are on. Cows or no cows it ALL looks like that now in that area of the state during dry times of the year. After the summer monsoon it can look completely different.

One has to be really careful when using photos to make a scientific case. For example the photos must be taken during the same time of year and on a year with similar moisture.

Also, he keeps saying that things have gotten worse in the last 50 years and only mentions lack of cows but not once does he mention the fact that the globe is warmer. If you add an extra degree or two of temperature every day to a plot of soil for a year then you lose a lot more moisture.

Finally, I got a kick out of the image of the cattle ranch that had no grass on it but on the other side of the fence outside of their cattle ranch it looked completely grassy. It's at the 17:18 mark. Big red flag there! Land with no cattle looks awesome and the cattle ranch has no vegetation at all.

While it is unclear if what he says has any truth to it we know for a fact that overgrazing is a HUGE problem:

[drynberg]

13. If Mr. Savory is right, and I think he is, this method of reversing Global Climate Change needs to

Be enlarged way beyond 50 million hectacres, as Africa has at least a Billion hectacres moving towards desertification. How about the UN and the US government at least testing these methods on significant acreage? If isn't like we got a lot of time to talk and decide, the boom is coming closer every day, can you hear it? Please act and write reps, papers, friends, social media, etc. to spread this idea as the time is getting so short...And thanks for posting.

[tsites]

14. I stop watching TED videos

I used to be a big fan, then it started being a forum for fringe science, bad science and touchy feelly nonsense, always presented with a smugness that thumbs it's nose at a straw-man scientific community they present as dogmatically supporting the status quo and that they and only they have the clear solution to the worlds problems. Allan Savory seems typical of this type. I don't doubt his sincerity, but the fact that he doesn't really present evidence, data or explain his method or controls makes me feel he is being swayed by confirmation bias rather than real measurable results.

Having lived in arid and semi-arid parts of Texas most of my life I have witnessed the exact opposite of what he claims. Land quickly recovering in both abundance and diversity as soon as grazing animals are removed or significantly reduced. Some areas have done better with limited livestock than none, but never better with commercial numbers. Large herds of buffalo were never widespread beyond the Texas panhandle region so most land health could never have depended on concentrations of large animals. Historic pictures (19th century) from west and south Texas taken in areas before cattle were introduced, show rich and dense plant life while those taken after, show denuded land and erosion (pictures taken when people moved into west Texas for mining, but before they turned to ranching). We also must understand that recovery can depend also on the reintroduction of native grasses and micro fauna. Most of the grasses we see are imports, brought in because they were thought to be better fodder for livestock. These grasses often do not do as well unless significantly managed, usually at the expense of diversity, while the reintroduction of native grasses almost always promotes a healthier and more robust ecology.

One point cannot be ignored is the diversion of surface water and the draining of aquifers and climate change. No matter what you do, if the water isn't there, nothing will grow. Desertification is complex and it can't be solved with a single solution.

[Quixote1818]

15. Nicely said

As I pointed out, after I posted the video I did more research and discovered he was full of shit. All your points are well made.

[tsites]

16. The Slate article you linked sums it up

Your link to the article in Slate has a quote from Savory in which he states,“You’ll find the scientific method never discovers anything. Observant, creative people make discoveries.” To me this says all you need to know about him. Disregard for the scientific method while claiming scientific "discoveries" is the worst kind of junk science. Whenever following the rules doesn't give someone the answer they want, the answer is not to change the rules.