—Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Do we have enough of our most precious of resources — water — to satisfy both our current and future human, animal and plant needs? Are we clinging to false hopes that current droughts and diminished available atmospheric moisture are just part of a long term “cycle” that will soon replenish itself to parity returning us all to plentiful water supplies? Without cataclysmic climate change, I don’t see it happening.

Our quandary, it seems to me, is similar to the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s ancient mariner’s plight expressed in his poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” In it, the ancient mariner could only plead with his shipmates of his innocence of killing the albatross that they initially thought had led them out of the doldrums. Unforeseen by them, the bird actually led them into more debacles. They struggled with calamity after calamity, and were eventually becalmed in an endless sea of brackish saltwater of which they could drink none to slake their thirst.

Metaphorically, like the Ancient Mariner, we, too, find ourselves desperate for water not only for our morning showers and toothbrushing but also our livelihoods as we quench the never ending water needs of cattle in our processes to deliver meat to America’s and the world’s tables.

Over their life cycle, cattle need 1,847 gallons to produce a pound of finished beef, according to Denver Water. Say what!?! The water footprint for a pound of pork is 78 gallons, and for chicken, 468 gallons. By the way, it takes 1.1 gallons of water to grow one almond and 1,900 gallons to grow 1 pound. One gallon of cow’s milk requires 1,950 gallons of water. Conversely, 1 pound of tofu requires 302 gallons of water to produce, while 1 pound of unprocessed oats requires 290 gallons of water to produce, according to studies done at UC Davis.

It is my view, desiccation in our farmlands is tied directly to our unrestrained and wasteful human water uses and is a part of the reduction of our arable land. These droughts we experience every few years now are more than just the result of a La Niña or El Niño. The average person uses about 59 gallons per day for consumption and hygiene. Maybe we should be concentrating on reducing the human waste of water and not just treat it as a cattle-raising use. Taking shorter showers and shutting off the water while we brush our teeth would be a start.

We have a finite amount of water on this planet and that’s all we’ve got or ever will have. We can transform it into a solid (ice) or melt ice into a liquid; we can heat it into submission and form steam — witness Old Faithful, the geyser. We can transport it as I am faithfully doing right now, having transported water from my home in Denver to New York City with my “canteen” full of drinking water for my morning walks.

What can be done to save this receding tide of potable water? Is any effort, no matter its size or consequence, of any real help or just a waste of time? The inexorable loss of potable available water for agriculture, in favor of human use, is soon to overwhelm us anyway, right? Can we in the meat and poultry industry do anything to reduce our water use? I mean 1,847 gallons of water for a pound of beef sounds almost criminal. To add some perspective, that 1,847 gallons includes all water used in feed-grain production and the morning dew on grass which would eventually be used to feed cattle. And, all the water used in cattle production eventually gets recycled anyway.

Aside from needlessly pointing accusing fingers of blame, a better use of our brain stem is figuring out how to conserve water or maybe, God forbid, ration it. Tell me, what government entity do you want setting rationing rules for your use of water? I don’t know what a workable solution should be, but it seems to me that it must include some form of water conservation establishing a new normal use parameter for human existence.

'Water, Water everywhere, nor any drop to drink'

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