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Animal Cruelty

 

MEAT PRODUCTION - FACTORY FARMING

Pigs

This pig pictured to the right was reared on a factory farm. She has just had nine piglets, has nothing to lie on except a wire floor, and has very little movement.

She will be allowed to be with her piglets for around three weeks, and then they will be taken away. When they are taken she will fight and try and get back to them, but she will not see them again.

Within a couple weeks she will be put through another pregnancy like this. Sows commonly go through about five pregnancies before they are killed, so live their life continuously going through the agony of pregnancy in confined, barren conditions, and the agony of losing their babies at around three weeks.

This is the typical story for sows in a factory farm.

Most of the sow's babies will be reared for meat. On the factory farm they are kept in pens, inside, with little room to move and no access to fresh air or sunlight. After about five months they will be killed.

Pigs, like most animals, are killed by having their throat slit, whereupon they bleed to death. They may have been stunned beforehand with electric tongs or gas, but slaughterpeople have huge numbers of animals to kill and a set time to do the killing, so many animals are not completely stunned when the knife enters their throat. After stunning they are hoisted up in the air hanging from one leg, then their throat is slit.

To produce some meats, religion dictates that the animal may not be stunned so they are fully conscious when their throat is slit.

Birds

Birds like chickens, ducks and turkeys are kept in sheds. They never see the sunlight or fresh air. The birds have a bit of room to start but can hardly move as they get bigger. They typically have the space of a computer screen to move in.

Chickens are taken to slaughter at about six weeks. They have been bred to grow very quickly and are also fed growth-promoting hormones. Because they grow so quickly, their legs have trouble carrying the weight and their hearts struggle to cope. This means that many have broken bones and bone deformities which they suffer with. Because there are so many of them in a space together it is hard for suffering birds to be picked out, and farmers often do not have the inclination to care for the birds anyway.

When killed, chickens and turkeys have their legs placed in shackles and they are placed upside down on a moving conveyer. They are stunned by passing over an electrified bath. Often the chicken or turkey may move their head, in which case their throat is slit while they are fully conscious.

Fish

The rapidly emptying oceans caused by overfishing haven't put off the fishing industry, they have simply promoted farming of fish as the answer. Fish farming shares many of the problems of other intensive animal farming, not only causing immense suffering to fish, but resulting in pollution of the environment and destruction of wildlife.

The rearing of farmed fish is as intensive as any veal crate or battery cage. Terribly cramped, the fish can barely exercise and develop little muscle tissue. All they develop is sheer frustration at their conditions. Injuries to the snout and fins are common, generally caused by them rubbing against the net or by collision or aggression between fish.

Salmon are grown in freshwater hatcheries for 12-18 months, after which they are transferred to loch or estuary cages. The sudden transfer to seawater is such a trauma that large numbers die; sometimes as many as 50 per cent and rarely less than 15 per cent.

In the wild, salmon migrate over hundreds of miles, from the rivers where they are spawned to the open sea. They will even leap waterfalls to travel upstream to spawn. Thus their natural migratory behaviour is completely frustrated by keeping them in the small static cages that fish farming involves. Severe stress is a result and this can be seen in the fish's continual agitation and leaping. The high stocking density of 15kg fish/cubic metre is equivalent to keeping a 2 ft salmon in a bath.

Fingerling trout are reared in large tanks or earth ponds. They may be transferred to freshwater or floating sea cages. Trout are also kept at very high densities and suffer stress.

Killing takes place in one of a number of ways:

1. The fish's gill arches are cut or torn and life is literally drained as they are left to bleed to death. This results in fish moving convulsively and having muscular spasms for a considerable time, probably out of sheer pain and distress, and in a desperate attempt to escape the bleed-out tank. Sometimes fish may first be stunned in a tank with carbon dioxide gas bubbled through it. This causes such distress to the fish that they try to escape violently when put into the tank.

2. The fish may be removed from the water and placed on ice. Fish take a long time to die and can feel what is happening to them for up to 15 minutes.

3. The fish is killed by a blow to the head with a club. Frequently the fish will not be completely stunned and injured because such large numbers are being killed and the killer is under pressure to kill a set number of fish.

4. Fish may be electrocuted in a large tank.

 

MEAT PRODUCTION - 'FREE RANGE'

The term free range is very misleading because it implies that the free range animal is free to roam where she wishes. This would not be possible because most animals would wander off never to return so it is not in any way practical to allow animals 'free range'.

In reality 'free range' animals are still confined and sometimes their conditions are not much different to the conditions of factory farmed animals. 'Free range' animals bred for their meat also get their throat slit at the end of the day, and their life taken away from them to put food on a plate.

Hens

'Free range' hens bred for their meat are often kept in sheds in flocks of up to 16,000. They are allowed access to the outside, as the law requires, but frequently there are not enough pop-holes giving access to the outside so many birds never leave the sheds.

Overcrowding inside the sheds can also mean problems with aggression, feather-pecking and cannibalism.

Although 'free range' claims to be the humane option, debeaking is in fact more common in 'free range' hens than battery hens. Debeaking is where a hen has the tip of their beak removed with a red-hot cutter. The hen's beak is very sensitive so this causes immense suffering.

Like factory farmed hens they will stunned in an electric tank, and their throat slit.

Sheep

Most sheep are kept in fields and not in intensive conditions, but they are not suited to living on fields which tend to be damp lowlands, and this make them prone to foot diseases. Four million sheep die each year of cold, hunger, sickness, pregnancy complications or injury and one million lambs die of exposure within a few days of birth.

Sheep, like pigs, may be stunned with electric tongs. They may also be stunned with the captive bolt pistol. If aimed correctly, the pistol causes the animal to lose consciousness immediately, but if the animal moves slightly it may not be stunned the first time, and be in absolute agony. The whole procedure is terrifying, with sheep lined up and able to see what is happening to the sheep that go before them.

Cows are also stunned with the captive bolt pistol.

Fish

Fish could be termed as free range when they are taken from the ocean, but still the effect that sea fishing has had on the oceans has been enormous. Suffering has been caused to millions of fish, many species have been wiped out or critically endangered, and the ocean itself has been damaged. Bottom trawls, for instance, rip up plants and destroy the seabed habitat.

Fish caught in trawl nets are hauled from the sea struggling as their life slowly and painfully drains away. Many are crushed to death under the weight of countless other dying fish. Those that survive and hit the deck of the ship either suffocate to death or are gutted whilst still alive. Some fish, like plaice, can take hours to suffocate. This horrific tangle of agony and death occurs every time a boat hauls in its nets.

 

EGG PRODUCTION

Hens kept to provide eggs are usually confined in battery cages for their entire lives, where they can not fully stretch their wings. Each hen will have the space of an A4 piece of paper to live in.

They are forced to live on wire, which is highly uncomfortable and causes their feet to become deformed. They frequently fight because of their living conditions.

'Free range' hens kept for egg-laying are all too often put into windowless sheds with exits to the outside. Sometimes the space outside may be too small for many of them to fit, so some may never see fresh air.

Whether the hens are 'free range' or factory farmed, the male chicks will be gassed to death at one day old as they are of no use to the egg farmer.

Many hens, whether free-range or battery, have the tip of their beak cut off, an agonising procedure. They are debeaked to stop them fighting, a common occurrence because of the stressful conditions they are forced to live in.

 

DAIRY PRODUCTS

In order to produce milk, the mother cow must be made pregnant. She then spends 9 months carrying the calf. After all that time, the mother gets to see her calf for an average of two days and then the calf is taken away so that humans can drink the milk that was meant for the calf.

This cause huge amounts of distress and upset for both the mother and calf, who should be together for much longer than that. Farmers have actually reported the mother cow crying for her calf for days after the calf has gone.

The mother will then be made pregnant again, and again, and again so that she will continue to provide milk. This continues until she is so worn out that she is killed.

Almost 100% of cows suffer from laminitis, a painful inflammation of the tissue lining around the foot.

Of the calves that are born, some are bred for meat, some kept to produce milk and some sent abroad to veal crates.

Veal crates are illegal in this country but it is not illegal to send calves from here to veal crates abroad. In veal crates new-born calves are locked in crates, not allowed to move, and underfed until they are slaughtered and served as veal. They are fed a special diet so that the meat will remain white.

 

HOW CAN YOU HELP?
Cut out all animal products and take a vegan diet. Read our Guide to Going and Staying Vegan and find out more...