Most animals are not fed exclusively on grain. For example, cattle are grazed or fed silage, then often (but not always) fattened up for a month or more in a feedlot. Feedlots dont only feed grain.
Next, feed corn has a yield ten times that of sweet corn.
That would be a fascinatingly astute analogy if flying children routinely migrated thousands of miles and foraged over entire continents. But since they don’t, it’s a completely useless analogy.
Not “on a tour”. I visit wineries to taste and buy wine and speak with the staff and often the owners and winemakers. Birds are a big problem in Ontario vineyards. If they aren’t scared off by various repellent devices, the losses of some varieties of grapes by harvest time would be 100%. If they’re scared off, they forage elsewhere and seem to survive just fine. Groundhogs and other pests seem to be a much bigger problem in California than here, but regardless, if they’re controlled with predators like owls or other humane methods I don’t see a problem. If you’re trying to make the case that rodent control is somehow morally the same as raising livestock in horrible, inhumane conditions so they can be slaughtered for our culinary pleasures, then you’re not making an argument at a level of rationality that I care to participate in. Vineyards in my experience are, in both appearance and fact, as harmonious with nature as a large-scale enterprise can ever be, their proprietors often conscientious environmentalists, and they are often wonderful assets to countrysides that are already rich in natural beauty. If you think there’s any sort of rational comparison to be made with industrial cattle farms or slaughterhouses, suit yourself.
You don’t have a point, as far as I can tell.
Here’s a story that just came out today. An independent family-owned pork producer talks about his commitment to a niche but growing market for organic pork from naturally fed and humanely raised pigs, in accordance with the Certified Humane Raised and Handled standards of the Humane Farm Animal Care organization and other US and Canadian standards. The pens are almost 6 times bigger than they are in industrial farms, “pigs have freedom of movement, have hay underfoot instead of metal slats and can engage in natural behaviours such as playing and rooting. There is also a higher standard for air quality in barns where they are raised.”
So I agree, there’s definitely a middle ground between outright vegetarianism and being completely uncaring.
The same is true for opening up grazing land. Cattle step on lizards, chase birds from their nests, and so on. A cattle ranch is no less ecologically intrusive than a wheat-field. Opening a region to cattle results in as many deaths as the wheat field does.
So, no, you haven’t proven your point.
And, having eaten both factory raised pork and chicken, and pastured pork and chicken, the animals that can walk around and root and otherwise act normally, and eat a variety of food, are tougher but a lot tastier than their caged counterparts.
(Larger pens may not affect the flavor. But I feel a lot better about eating an animal that got to live a decent life.)
Somehow, “Don’t eat meat” doesn’t have much pizzazz to it. I miss the earlier Pope (John Paul Something-or-Other) who had better advice, especially for our young people (“Don’t smoke dope. Don’t screw around.”).
Yes, or vice versa. 
Nope, cattle are grazers and graze happliy on native grasses- of which there could be hundreds of species. They take the niche of the bison.
Wheat is a mono-crop, one plant growing over thousands of acres. Everything else is killed.
Well…okay. Sheep. Sheep kill every plant in the pasture. Every single goddamn plant. Where sheep are penned, you see bare dirt and nothing else. At all.
So…cattle are okay (kinda) but sheep are as bad as wheat.
True, so don’t pen them, just let them graze in a pasture. I admit we could & should make some much needed adjustments to our meat eating- eat less meat, less feedlot fattening, letting animals graze more, no over-grazing, feeding more waste and silage- less grain. No everyday use of antibiotics. All this would make for happier animals, a better environment and meat that is actually better for us to eat- not to mention tastier. So- reforms- YES! Banning meat- NO!
Visit Ireland. There are sheep everywhere, and plenty of grass. If they have enough space, and there is enough water, they don’t kill all the vegetation.
Irish lamb is delicious, by the way. Almost as good as Icelandic.
The Pope is probably right but I just can’t bring myself to stop eating this delicious hot dog…