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Comment by baron816 | Hacker News Reader

I’m wondering how many fish, birds, and mammals get eaten by non-humans every day. I wouldn’t be surprised if that number is less than the number of animals humans slaughter. Like, I’ve heard that there are more chickens alive right now than all other birds combined. I think it’s a similar thing for pets and livestock when it comes to mammals.

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As to the second half of your comment, you may be interested in this (mammal and bird biomass estimates): https://ourworldindata.org/wild-mammals-birds-biomass

I would assume that the majority of the animals that humans kill are kept in captivity and therefore not exposed to other animals. Since this breeding/captivity is happening at a staggering scale, my second assumption is that animals have absolutely no way of keeping up with humans. I would also like to see the numbers of kills by non-humans too! I’m quite appalled actually, seeing it laid out like this, and I eat my share of chicken and fish..

Edit: typo

> I’m wondering how many fish, birds, and mammals get eaten by non-humans every day

https://xkcd.com/1338/

https://ourworldindata.org/wild-mammals-birds-biomass

> I wouldn’t be surprised if that number is less than the number of animals humans slaughter

https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/press-release/our-glob...

Our global food system is the primary driver of biodiversity loss

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26231772/

Biodiversity conservation: The key is reducing meat consumption

> Like, I’ve heard that there are more chickens alive right now than all other birds combined

https://ourworldindata.org/wild-mammals-birds-biomass#global...

We have twice as much poultry by weight as wild birds.

> We have twice as much poultry by weight as wild birds.

https://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/the-truth-about-cats-and-...

In a paper published today in the journal PLOS One, Okin says he found that cats and dogs are responsible for 25 to 30 percent of the environmental impact of meat consumption in the United States. If Americans’ 163 million Fidos and Felixes comprised a separate country, their fluffy nation would rank fifth in global meat consumption

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