I sent a vegan friend of mine the article in which that professor said more
animals in the field are killed from growing gains than are killed to be
eaten. She sent me this letter, which a vegan friend of hers apparently sent
to the publisher of the article:

"I hope the piece in your April 1st issue describing veganism as a "killer
diet" was some sort of April Fools joke.  If not, then I have now officially
heard every absurd argument ever conceived.  This article reported on a
certain agriculture professor from Oregon that claimed a strict vegetarian
diet caused animals to suffer.  He made this point by arguing that animals
are butchered when crops are harvested. What this meat industry apologist
failed to mention is that far more crops have to be grown to fatten
livestock than would ever be consumed by human beings. If you are concerned
about field mice being hurt when corn is harvested, then don't eat meat.
Most of that corn is used to feed livestock.  A vegetarian diet would
drastically reduce the amount of crop land needed to feed billions."

It seems like people on each side could go back and forth forever with
equally good arguments! Still I like to send her pro-meat articles because
vegans are so self-righteous :-) I wish I still had the msg sent today by
someone on the list who said that cows mostly aren't fed grain, and that
Europe can't give grain away, so I could forward it to my vegan friend . . .
does anyone still have that msg by any chance?