If you grew up in suburbia like me, you might not have ever considered the fact that cows are pretty gassy creatures.

Just ask the German farmer who in 2014 had to deal with a slight exploding shed problem, thanks to his dairy cattle's burps.

Turns out the thing that exploded was methane--aka the natural gas that you might use to cook your food.

And Bessie over here, can belch up something like 200 to 600 liters of the stuff every single day.

Methane is a product of the crazy digestive system cows have--with four, yea four, stomachs.

Stomach number one is called the rumen, and it's home to a microbe zoo.

From protozoans to archaeans, you can find practically every major kind of life in there.

Why?

Cellulose, the carbohydrate that makes plants tough and fibrous, is technically impossible for the cow to digest on its own.

Which is why it needs the help of all those little microbe friends.

Some of them take the cellulose and break it down into less complex molecules that the cows can then digest.

The microbes release hydrogen gas and carbon dioxide as waste products.

That hydrogen gas, if it were allowed to build up, could interfere with further digestion, because it's actually toxic to the microbes.

That hydrogen gas, if it were allowed to build up, could interfere with further digestion, produce methane.

The breakdown of cellulose is more efficient when methanogens snap up that H2 right away.

produce methane.

Which means it loses up to 10% of the energy present in whatever grass or plant stuff it But it's kinda amazing that it gets energy from cellulose at all--thanks to that microbe Which means it loses up to 10% of the energy present in whatever grass or plant stuff it BImproperly ventilated barnsit gaside, the real reason to be worried about cow burps is that.

Over a period of 100 years, one kilogram of methane could potentially warm the Earth about 28 times as much as a kilogram of CO2.

And cows, along with other livestock, emit many many kilograms of methane from their burps -- about this many in 2007.

That's enough to make up about 7% of ALL greenhouse gases emitted by human activities.

The planet is paying a high price for our burgers and shakes.

So what can we do to save us from ourselves?

There are a couple of options: either cut down the amount of methane the cows produce in the first place, or find a way to capture and use it.

People are experimenting with adorable backpacks to collect cows' gassy emissions.

And while this strategy isn't widespread yet, enough methane has been collected to But it's probably more efficient to stop the burps in the first place.

And scientists have tried pretty much everything, with mixed results.

One approach has been to vaccinate the cows against their own gut microbes, persuading their immune system to straight up murder the methanogens.

Researchers have also supplemented cows' feed with essential oils like garlic, peppermint, and eucalyptus to aid their digestion.

And because the amount of methane a cow produces seems to be inherited, some researchers are on the hunt for a breeding fix, breathalyzing cows to see who's got the least methane on their breath and sending the clean ones off to have babies.

So there's no shortage of creative solutions, once we can actually put them into action.

Until then, enjoy your gassy half-pints and exploding barns.