I'm concerned about plants but I still eat them. And I'm concerned about animals and yet o still eat them. A better option is a matter of prejudice. I don't see our predicament as either or, meat or none, because all things and all ecosystems are connected, and cannot be disconnected by compassion for one thing over another. Moving a problem to a foreign shore doesn't stop it being a problem, it simply stops it being my problem.
The issues for, for example, owls, has generally more to do with industrial agriculture than grazing animals, (soil fertility directly affects prey species, insect numbers and in the case of peregrines, egg strength). All that ties in to the plant species which exist, can thrive, are allowed to, etc. Everything ties together. Vegetarianism works as a model where motive is the immediate suffering of an individual, but falls when discussing greater ecological systems, net gains and losses etc.
For anyone who has tried to meaningfully grow food in volume and reliability without animal byproducts like shit, for example, or animal death we find it is doable, but not successful enough to feed enough. The dilemmas facing those who consume meat and veg as opposed to those who consume only veg are the same ethically, because it is the same system. And that same system takes lives of animals and plants and microbes, except one section gives back and the other currently only takes. Some animals digestive systems are carnivorous, some are herbivorous and some are omnivorous. Some plants even are carnivorous too. We are of course omnivores, and it's only a choice by harnessing the purchasing power that 1st world countries can harness. We can be thankful for that possibility but I don't think we can be superior about it, not at least until we have supported ourselves for at least a couple of years entirely on produce we have collected where we live.
Going back to the owls; that is both a problem of vegetarians and omnivores alike. Every housing development, every piece of land dedicated to large scale ag, every herbicide and insecticide applied, every artificial npk fertiliser spread is a problem that contributes to the plight of every living thing outside of our unnatural industry. And all of that feeds us. The blame can no more be laid at the door of me than it can you. What we can do is acknowledge our place as a part in the ecosystem, and try to minimise our negative impact best we can. Part of that is work that saves niche species, part of that is acknowledging that nature can be cruel and beautiful at the same time, and not shy away from that understanding but embrace it more honestly.
For me to live, something has to die.
I am no more enamoured by the idea that must be a vaste swathe of land and all within it than I am by the idea that it must be a beast, or indeed a combination of those things. But if at the end, the land still lives, and the creatures in it too, I can deal with that. If a mouse dies to make an owl live (who cannot live on anything else), then so be it.