Di tutti i crimini neri che l'uomo commette contro il Creato, la vivizezione è il più nero. (Mahatma Gandhi)
Factory farms are hellholes worldwide. They are all the same on the four continents, exactly like KFC’s or McDonald’s—if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all.
Showing posts with label Cruelty - Crudeltà. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cruelty - Crudeltà. Show all posts
Una parte sconosciuta del mercato della pelliccia è la produzione di pelli di coniglio, incredibilmente alta rispetto a tutte le altre specie di animali. I numeri di pelli di coniglio messe sul mercato si stimano a livello mondiale intorno ad 1 miliardo l'anno. Nella sola Francia, paese tra i maggiori allevatori di conigli per qualunque finalità, vengono prodotte 70 milioni di pelli l'anno. Questi numeri ribaltano completamente quelli che fino ad ora sono stati diffusi dal movimento di liberazione animale, ma anche dal settore della pellicceria, riguardo agli animali scuoiati ogni anno. Fino ad ora già sembrava enorme la cifra di 40 milioni di animali, di cui tra i 25 e i 35 milioni visoni. Adesso, con questi dati alla mano non possiamo che fare alcune considerazioni sulle nuove strade percorse dall'industria della pelliccia, e quindi anche rivedere strategie e finalità della lotta per la scomparsa di questo macabro mercato.
IL MITO DEL CONIGLIO COME SOTTOPRODOTTO DELLA CARNE La scusa accampata dalle ditte che utilizzano pelli di coniglio è che queste derivano da scarti dell'industria della carne, e quindi ciò le renderebbe accettabili. Possiamo semplicemente rigettarla mettendo in evidenza la crudeltà nell'industria della macellazione e ponendo sullo stesso piano lo sgozzamento di un animale per cibarsene o lo scuoiamento per vestirsene. Così come non si dovrebbe in ogni modo indossare cadaveri di animali, rendendo accettabile tale tipo di indumento. Ma soprattutto qui ci preme fornire alcuni dati sull'allevamento dei conigli che smascherino tali menzogne e spieghino quanto spesso le pellicce di questo animale non provengano affatto dall'industria della carne ma da allevamenti appositi. Stesso discorso per i conigli d'Angora, utilizzati per la produzione di pelo, di cui tratteremo però a parte.
La produzione di carne è sicuramente il principale obiettivo dell'allevamento di conigli, ma al contrario di quanto si possa immaginare a livello storico le razze di conigli sono state selezionate in base alla pelliccia e non alla qualità della carne. Dalla pelle di questi animali si possono comunque recuperare due sottoprodotti: la pelliccia o il pelo (utilizzato come fosse lana). Questi sono comunque di bassa qualità, tanto che spesso le pelli di coniglio provenienti dai mattatoi vengono utilizzate per la produzione di concimi o di colle. Tali pelli vengono comunque spesso gettate via. Le tecniche di allevamento intensivo adottate in Europa sono infatti solitamente incompatibili con la produzione di pelli di qualità. Infatti la pelle rappresenta solo una minima percentuale del valore di un animale. Quindi sempre più frequentemente i conigli vengono macellati ad un età o in un periodo dell'anno in cui il loro manto non è ancora del tutto sviluppato. Questo accade di solito a 10 o 12 settimane, quando ancora hanno un manto infantile o sta cominciando a crescere quello semi-adulto. Questi manti leggeri e instabili non sono adatti per il settore della pellicceria.
La stagione in cui il manto è stabile e omogeneo infatti è l'inverno. Questo è vero per qualunque animale al di sopra dei sei mesi di età. Il resto dell'anno ci sono sempre aree del pelo vacanti e comunque una instabilità che lo rende inutilizzabile per l'uso dei pellicciai. Alcuni manti estivi possono essere omogenei, ma il coniglio deve avere almeno cinque mesi di età. Il manto estivo è comunque più sottile di quello invernale. Questo ciclo di crescita del pelo rende la produzione simultanea di pelliccia e carne un problema, e così la pelliccia diventa un semplice sottoprodotto di scarsa qualità, specialmente in produzione intensiva. In Francia per esempio meno della metà delle pelli raccolte nei mattatoi possono essere considerate utili per l'industria della pelliccia. Le uniche pelli di qualità provengono da adulti, ma la tendenza nella produzione moderna è di uccidere i piccoli, il che va a ridurre la proporzione di pelli adulte.
Non ci sono possibilità di fornire pellicce di qualità con le attuali condizioni di allevamento industriale per la carne. Per questo è crescente la presenza di allevamenti di conigli con la finalità di produrre pelli, che seguano il ciclo di crescita del pelo e le stagioni, e per i quali è la carne ad essere un sottoprodotto di bassa qualità.
ANGORA Se si parla di conigli non si può non far riferimento al coniglio d'Angora. Questa razza ha il pelame di una lunghezza che varia dai 10 ai 40 cm. Il procedimento per "prelevare questa pelliccia" è cambiato con il passare degli anni: all'inizio vi era lo spellamento, poi la tosatura ed infine la depilazione con la quale ogni singolo coniglio può produrre 1 kg e 300 gr di pelo annualmente per poi venire utilizzato nella creazione di maglioni, calze, abiti, etc. L'allevamento di conigli d'Angora è molto differente da quello per altre finalità, ed è stato nel tempo sviluppato in Francia, dove per molto è stata l'unica produzione derivante dai conigli. Adesso anche in altre nazioni, prima di tutte la Cina, si sta diffondendo questa specializzazione, e soprattutto offrono l'Angora a prezzi molto più bassi, avendo quasi fatto crollare il mercato francese. Per il pelo vengono utilizzate le femmine, e viene ridotta al minimo la riproduzione che diminuisce la produttività. Negli allevamenti solo il 3% circa degli animali sono riproduttori. In Francia i maschi non destinati alla riproduzione vengono uccisi alla nascita, per non affrontare le spese della loro crescita.
NUOVE MOSSE NEL MERCATO DELLA PELLICCERIA Il settore della pellicceria, dopo la grave crisi degli anni '90, in cui è calata fortemente la richiesta di capi interi, ha cominciato a riprendersi con il passaggio della moda verso la diffusione di inserti come polsini, colletti o decorazioni. Adesso è questo il settore di maggior diffusione delle pelli nella maggior parte dei paesi dove il movimento di liberazione animale è riuscito a creare almeno una critica verso quelle orde di cadaveri ambulanti che sono le pellicce. Nascondere la presenza delle pelli o ridurne la visibilità, renderle accettabili, colorarle per presentarle come moda giovane: queste sono state le mosse che hanno reso possibile una ripresa del settore. In tutto questo l'utilizzo di pelli di coniglio ha avuto una decisa crescita, soprattutto per il prezzo abbordabile, che ha permesso anche di colorarlo e inserirlo in capi economici e diffusi in qualunque tipo di negozio di moda o di grande magazzino. Colorare una pelle di visone o di cincillà può essere infatti rischioso e costoso nel caso di errore.
Situated conveniently close to the Channel ports, the elegant Belgian furrier's shop is a magnet for well-heeled British tourists, who are drawn inside by an elegant window display of luxurious coats and stoles.
At a time when fur is making a comeback in haute couture circles - with stars such as Madonna defiantly flaunting animal-skin fashion accessories - business has rarely been better at the old-established boutique run by Piet vander Eycken.
The bespectacled Belgian's wealthy clientele might be less willing to bolster his takings, however, if they knew the full range of items in his sales catalogue.
For, hidden away in a stockroom, behind the racks of mink and sable, are the pelts of dozens of slaughtered domestic cats.
They are readily available in every shade, from ginger tabby, tortoiseshell and marmalade to deep chocolate brown.
Presumably, however, Mr vander Eycken (whose name has been changed for legal reasons) keeps these furs out of view for fear of causing offence.
Yet when anyone asks specifically for 'cat', he is happy, indeed proud, to parade his wares, as I discovered when I met up with a team from the Humane Society of the United States in a joint investigation into the burgeoning cat and dog fur trade.
"I can show you many colours,' he said, thumbing through piles of unmistakably sleek feline pelts, after we asked him to make us a cat blanket - or rheumadecker - which are believed by some on the Continent to be beneficial for arthritis and rheumatism.
"I think these particular ones have been farmed (in Belgium). But I have others that are not from farms. There are places where they catch them. For dogs, it is the same. They are caught and brought to a specialist institute and if no one picks them up they get shot."
'Cat hunters' at work in London
Not long ago, he said nonchalantly, the bulk of his cats were brought by ferry from England.
Ruthless 'cat-hunters' in London would go around in vans, rounding up pets, and bring them to him for sale (as he spoke I recalled how a cat of my own had once vanished without trace). Today, they are more likely to be caught in Ghent or Brussels.
Before our investigation began, the Humane Society had uncovered evidence that some two million cats and dogs were being killed each year, often by the most barbaric methods. But until now, they were believed to originate exclusively from China and the Far East.
But as Mr vander Eycken chatted to his customers, he unwittingly provided an insight into a more shocking - and hitherto unknown - aspect of the trade: that of clandestine cat-fur farmers and cat thieves operating in the heart of Europe.
Our video footage, shot recently during a week-long incognito visit to the furriers of Belgium, was passed to Scottish Euro MP Struan Stevenson and forms the centrepiece of his campaign to have the cat and dog fur trade banned in Europe, as it has been in the U.S.
Mr Stevenson explained: "We had to confront the assertion that there was no cat or dog farming in the EU or the 10 countries that are about to join, and your film did just that.
"We've had the rugs you bought tested microscopically to confirm they are cat. And apparently these cats are being farmed, or collected, on the streets of Belgium, right under the noses of the EU commissioners who sit in their ivory towers and say it is just not happening."
Brussels bureaucrats were refusing to initiate a ban, he added, because the World Trade Organisation says it is unlawful to prevent trade on animal welfare grounds. But the sale of cat fur ought to be outlawed under consumer fraud leglislation, because products were almost always fitted with misleading labels.
This had been proved when an investigator visited China, where he posed as a potential importer. When he told a Chinese government official who accompanied him that items labelled 'cat' might cause offence in the West, the mandarin smiled.
"This is China," he replied, "we don't worry about things like that. We'll use whatever label you want.' He then trotted out a list of wellused bogus names such as ' Mongolian dog' and 'China wolf'.
In the cynical, heartless and ruthlessly exploitative secret world of the cat and dog fur traders, such tactics are wearily routine, as the Daily Mail/Humane Society investigation discovered.
Cat farms operating across the Channel
Although at least one cat farm appears to be operating just across the Channel, the vast majority of pelts are collected in the Far East, where there are scores of smallholdings keeping anything from a handful of cats or dogs to several hundred.
Because they are good-natured, easily-bred and need comparatively little food and husbandry, cats are particularly popular.
They are crammed into small bamboo cages and kept until their pelts are luxuriant and full-sized.
They are then executed in a horrific manner: lassooed with a noose slipped through the cage bars and around their necks, then hoisted, meowing and wriggling, until they fall silent. In this way, the pelts - the only thing that concerns their keepers - are not damaged.
In one farm, a two-hour flight from Beijing, investigators filmed more than a dozen cats being garrotted in this way until finally only one was left. Frozen with terror after witnessing the death of his companions, he bobbed and weaved his head in a frantic - but vain - effort to avoid the noose.
At another farm, in the Philippines, two caged cats were shown hugging one another in the apparent knowledge that they were about to die.
"They had seen 20 other cats pulled up and hanged," says Rick Swain, the Humane Society's chief investigator, who recently exposed the scandal of lamb foetus coats (like the one worn by Madonna) and has led the global pet fur inquiry.
"It's hard to believe that they didn't know what was happening, given the way they behaved.
"They were full-grown cats and they actually had their paws around one another. They were staring at the hidden camera absolutely petrified.
"These weren't farmed cats, they were strays picked up by rustlers. One had a heart-shaped collar so we know it was a family pet."
Farmed dogs are killed with similarly efficient brutality. Usually they are strung up by the legs, then an artery in the thigh is cut so that they bleed to death. Again, this avoids damage to their coats.
The profits are vast. Impoverished and ignorant farmers will sell their pelts to the tanneries for perhaps £1 or £1.50 each. By the time they are sold in Europe they can fetch 20 or 30 times that amount.
In one fashionable fur shop, in a small Flemish market town near Antwerp, we were offered a Chinese green-tabby cat coat for almost £2,000.
We were offered a 12-skin blanket for £220 although some high quality ones made with up to 80 skins
Nell'autunno 2007 è iniziata una campagna globale contro l'industria della pelliccia e contro ESCADA. Molti gruppi per la liberazione animale e attivisti si sono mobilitati per partecipare a questa campagna. L' obiettivo della campagna è abolire il commercio di pellicce in tutte le sue forme. Ci inspiriamo ad idee emancipatorie e cerchiamo di svilupparle ulteriormente, idee che si oppongono ad una società basata sullo sfruttamento e promuoviamo solidarietà con animali ed umani, vittime della violenza e dell'oppressione, perciò anche con le vittime dell'industria della pelliccia e le vittime di ESCADA. La campagna non finirà fino a quando ESCADA non rimuoverà ogni articolo in pelliccia o con inserti di vero pelo dalle proprie collezioni.
Il nome ESCADA si riferisce ad un bellissimo cavallo irlandese che la stessa compagnia sfoggia nel loro sito web; un cavallo che non vuole essere domato ne dominato. Il network globale contro l'industria della pelliccia si chiede come ESCADA, che dimostra di essere affascinata da un animale cosi libero e selvaggio, possa essere coinvolta in qualcosa di cosi brutale come l'uso violento e la distruzione di migliaia di individui: i così detti "animali da pelliccia" che ESCADA indirettamente deruba della loro libertà forzandoli in gabbia e rendendoli parte dell industria della pelliccia. ESCADA si autoproclama compagnia internazionale di alta moda, con sede ad Aschheim/Munich, Germania. La gamma di prodotti varia da design per donna (abiti da sera, abbigliamento sportivo e da ufficio), abbigliamento per bambini, accessori e profumi. Il gruppo ESCADA è proprietario di una compagnia sussidiaria chiamata PRIMERA che a sua volta è proprietaria dei marchi APRIORI, BIBA, CAVITA E LAUREL. Tutti questi marchi utilizzano pelliaccia nelle loro collezioni.
IL RUOLO DI ESCADA NELL'INDUSTRIA DELLA PELLICCIA Il settore della vendita al pubblico gioca un ruolo vitale per quest'industria ed è la vendita del prodotto finito che decide se il buisiness è lucrativo. ESCADA è implicata in svariati stadi dei processi di produzioni: disegna le proprie collezioni, le produce nei propri stabilimenti e le vende nei propri negozi o in concessioni nei grandi magazzini. Per queste ragioni ESCADA è da considerarsi responsabile per l'imprigionamento e l'uccisione dei cosidetti animali da pelliccia. Se ESCADA smettesse di vendere pellicce sarebbe un chiaro segnale per tutte le casa di moda; chiarirebbe che gli abiti in pelliccia non sono ne chic ne glamour, la violenza non lo è mai stata.
VIOLENZA SUGLI ANIMALI DA PELLICCIA E STRATEGIE DI DISSIMULAZIONE Migliaia di visoni, procioni, chinchillà, conigli, ed altri animali sono tenuti in gabbia per mesi per poi essere gassati o uccisi tramite elettrocuzione. Altri animali vengono catturati e uccisi nel loro habitat naturale tramite delle trappole. Negare la capacità di questi animali di provare paura, sofferenza e negare la violenza perpetuata nei loro confronti è da tempo la strategia usata da allevatori, pellicciai e venditori per nascondere le brutalità di questo mercato. L'industria della moda inventa sempre nuovi metodi per nascondere la vera indentità della pelliccia: riducendo la pelle degli animali in pezzi, tingendola, rasandola, distoglie l'attenzione da quello che la pelliccia realmente è, facendola sembrare sempre più come il tessuto con il quale viene combinata. Cucita su giacche, guanti, sciarpe e giubbotti tendiamo a dimenticare che quella pelliccia apparteneva ad un animale, un' individuo cosciente con la capacità di provare gioia e tristezza, con interessi e desideri. Dire che la pelliccia è un prodotto naturale è un altro tentativo di ingannare la gente. Le pelli industrialmente prodotte attraversano una moltitudine di processi chimici e meccanici con un altissimo consumo di energia e una grande produzione di rifiuti chimici. È patetico che l'industria della pelliccia si aggrappi ancora al mito della naturalezza. Lo sfruttamento animale ed il totale dominio sui loro corpi è un prodotto della nostra cultura. È il simbolo del potere socialmente organizzato sulla natura e sugli animali. Lo sfruttamento animale è da definirsi perciò una catastrofe e assolutamente non naturale.
MOSTRA AL GRUPPO ESCADA CHE ANCHE TU NON SUPPORTI QUESTO MERCATO! Cosa puoi fare: - non comprare nessun prodotto ESCADA (incluso APRIORI, BIBA, PRIMERA, CAVITA, LAUREL) fino a che non faranno la scelta etica di non vendere più pellicce - non comprare alcun prodotto di pelliccia o con inserti di vero pelo - contattate il gruppo ESCADA e fate sapere loro che anche voi siete contro l'uso di pellicce. ricorda che del gruppo ESCADA fanno parte PRIMERA, BIBA, APRIPRI, CAVITA e LAUREL: ESCADA AG Margaretha-Ley-Ring 1 D-85609 Aschheim-München email: info@de.esada.com telefono: 0049 89/9944-0 fax: 0049 89/99 44-1111 -supporta anche tu il network contro l'industria della pelliccia, partecipa alle proteste o inviaci informazioni e fonti.
PetSmart may be smart about making money, but it's clueless when it comes to taking proper care of the animals it buys and sells by the millions.
The company's trade in live animals supports a mass-breeding industry just as cruel as—and less regulated than—the puppy mill industry; results in abysmal treatment of tiny, vulnerable beings; and ultimately leads to their overpopulation, homelessness, neglect, and suffering.
Take a closer look at PetSmart and please do not buy anything from PetSmart until it stops selling all animals.
What's Wrong with Petsmart?
The small animals sold at PetSmart cost the multibillion-dollar company next to nothing and make up a minuscule percentage of the company's total sales. So why does PetSmart buy them by the thousands only to leave them to die from disease and injury?
The answer is simple. Adorable hamsters are frequently bought on impulse when parents can't resist their child's pleading. The hamster may not cost much, but supplies add up quickly. Cages, bedding, food, and other paraphernalia amount to millions of dollars in annual profit.
PetSmart sells birds and other animals to people who often buy them on impulse and don't have a clue about how to care for them properly. Just as there are puppy mills, there are enormous bird factories and massive animal "suppliers," where breeders warehouse thousands of "breeding stock," whose babies are taken away and sold. Regulation of such massive facilities is often lax or non-existent, leaving the monitoring of breeders to the company itself—and leaving the animals to suffer the consequences.
PetSmart Store Investigation in Manchester, Connecticut, 2006-2007
For years, PetSmart has assured PETA that sick and injured animals in its stores are provided with veterinary care when they need it. They didn't take the company's word for it. During an undercover investigation at the PetSmart store in Manchester, Connecticut—a store that has a Banfield companion animal hospital right inside it and that PetSmart boasts of as having an "outstanding pet care team" and an "exceptional pet care record"—PETA documented more than 100 small animals, including hamsters, domestic rats, lizards, chinchillas, and birds, who were deprived of veterinary care and slowly dying in the store's back room, out of customers' sight.
PETA alerted PetSmart's corporate headquarters to the suffering of animals at its Manchester store while their investigator was working at the store undercover. An e-mail message they sent to PetSmart executive Bruce Richardson reported that there were "animals … routinely deprived of veterinary care [who] often suffer and die as a result." The message yielded nothing but a meaningless, dishonest reply from Richardson, in which he wrote: "This particular store has an outstanding pet care team and an exceptional pet care record. No pet that has required a vet has been deprived of that service."
The following are just two examples of the many disturbing entries from the PETA investigator's daily log:
* On October 23, 2006, a hamster in cage 10 in the sick room was found dead. This was one of the hamsters that I took to the vet on October 20, 2006, due to her having wet tail and crusty eyes. [The Pet Care Manager] had brought her back to the sick room before the vet could see her and told me that … she did not need to see the vet. * On October 26, 2006, the supervisor brought out a long-haired hamster who had died in the sick room. She had been isolated on October 22 for wet tail, and the chart records showed her slow and painful death. Initially the hamster had diarrhea, but she continued to deteriorate and the night before she died the log notes stated, "eyes shut, hard, dying."
The PetSmart back room log notes document the suffering of animals who are "diagnosed" by store employees. Over a three-day period, three different supervisors—including the pet care manager—at the Manchester store wrote on a dying calico hamster's chart, "[Day 1, morning] wobbly, dehydrated, diarrhea … [Day 1, evening] very lethargic/dehydrated, regressing … [Day 2, morning] very wobbly, dehydrated … [Day 2, evening] dehydrated/getting hard, very lethargic … [Day 3, morning] dying, no meds given, can't swallow, regressed … [Day 3, evening] dead," but did not take the animal to a veterinarian even to have her put out of her misery.
The photos of some of the animals treated for diseases such as wet tail and upper respiratory infections show just how miserable they were as they languished, untreated, in PetSmart's custody.
PetSmart's billions mean nothing but penny-pinching shortcuts and misery for the little animals neglected by the company, which is clearly unwilling to or incapable of caring for animals—period. Please do not buy anything from PetSmart until it stops selling all animals. Buy your supplies online or at a store that does not sell animals.
PetSmart Investigation: Investigator's Log
Manchester, Connecticut Wednesday,
October 11, 2006
The reptile enclosure is disgusting. It's dirty, and all of the individual cages emit an almost unbearable stench of dead, rotting crickets. A1 said their district manager refuses to get a new enclosure because she thinks this one is fine. She agreed that it is dirty and hard to clean and also went on to say that they lose reptiles all the time because they can fit through some of the cracks. She said that when they had (somehow) opened up the whole thing last, they found a bunch of dead lizards and geckos on the very bottom.
Friday, October 13, 2006
I medicated, cleaned, and fed the animals in the sick and new arrivals rooms. There are shockingly unhealthy animals that need to be euthanized. There are 17 animals in total in the sick room. Most of the animals being treated have some sort of either diarrhea or wet tail. One hamster has extreme wet tail. Her left eye looks almost sealed shut. She is very shaky and can barely walk or even move. There is a very unhappy winter white hamster. She screams constantly anytime anyone comes in and just gets louder and angrier when you approach her cage. She has swollen paws and sores, and to me it seems like she also has possible mouth sores.
Saturday, October 14, 2006
A woman wanted one of the parakeets in the aviary. I watched K., a manager in training who used to work for PETCO, spend roughly 15 minutes trying to catch one of these birds. This is a terrible process. All the birds become extremely stressed and exhausted flying all around the glass enclosure. K. finally caught the parakeet the woman wanted by basically smashing it against the glass with the net. Many of these birds fall to the floor while trying to avoid the net. A woman and her three kids brought in a hamster to return because she was sneezing and seemed to have an infection. E. asked her if she wanted a different one, and the woman said that "three hamsters in five months is enough for me—I don't think I can take another one dying."
Monday, October 16, 2006
In the fridge, there were six dead hamsters and one unlabeled bag. In the sick room were two dead hamsters. One was a short-haired hamster with a really bad case of wet tail. Poor thing. You can see on the video how bad it was for her. Her sheet said she was placed in the sick room today. I found her lying dead next to her water dish. The other was a Chinese dwarf hamster. She had been back there since July 30, 2006. Under the diagnosis portion, this is what was written: "Bloated, crusted eyes, bloody nose, and going to vet." Well, obviously, they didn't get her to the vet fast enough. I found her lying dead under a piece of fake log in her cage.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
As I was carrying 10 dead animals (nine hamsters and one not labeled) from the fridge to the vet clinic, J. (manager) approached me and said, "The hamster in tank died (in the sick room). You know, the little one that you said needs a vet." I sighed and went back to the sick room (J. [manager] laughed). Sure enough, she had died. Mouth and eyes wide open, except the eye that was sealed shut. She looked terrible. I again went back to Banfield (the vet office in store) to give them the deceased. The woman (vet tech, I think) initially replied, "Great, more critters." As she was putting them in the freezer, she said, "Just put them in here with all the other PetSmart critters."
Friday, October 20, 2006
I took four animals to the vet at 9:05 a.m.: Cage 2—Short-haired hamster; conditions (also refer to chart): head-tilting and spinning in circles, also blood apparently spattered in cage, which I haven't seen yet, but it's written on her log sheet. Cage 5—Long-haired hamster, recently had been brought back to the sick room (isolated October 17); conditions (also refer to chart): extreme wet tail, very lethargic, eyes sealed shut. Cage 10—Honey hamster; conditions (also refer to chart): lethargic, very dehydrated, wet tail, URI, eyes crusted shut Cage 14—Winter white hamster; conditions (also refer to chart): fight wounds (front legs), possible mouth sores, VERY UNHAPPY, and screams every time anyone comes close to her cage. A2 came in at 1 and I advised her of the situation. She went to check on them and came back and told me that two of them did not need to see a vet—cages 10 and 14. I told her that they were very ill-looking this morning and seemed to be suffering quite a bit. She said that they are actually improving and to look at the notes on the chart. I told her I had looked at the notes on the chart, but that didn't change the fact that their current conditions were terrible. It is possible for them to get worse, even if they had previously been improving. She placed them back into the sick room without their ever being seen by the vet. The other two are still at the vet, and I haven't heard anything about their condition. Saturday, October 21, 2006 Re the hamsters I took to the vet yesterday: Dr. B. JUST looked at the animals I took in BEFORE they opened yesterday. So, these animals in need of urgent medical attention just sat in their office for over 24 hours. A2 said what's scary is that this isn't even as bad as it's been, referring to the sick room.
Monday, October 23, 2006
Back by the sick room, I found charts for three animals sitting outside the door and these are the notes written on them: Black bear hamster (cage 3)—moved to the aviary this morning. Honey hamster (cage 10)—found dead this morning. Yes, yes, and yes, this was one of the hamsters I took to the vet on October 20 due to her having wet tail, URI, dehydration, crusty eyes, and inactive behavior. A2 brought her back to the sick room before the vet could see her and told me that since she was improving, she did not need to see the vet. WELL, OBVIOUSLY SHE DID!
Sunday, November 5, 2006
Animals just keep dying all the time, it's unbelievable. For the EXTREMELY short period of time (five minutes maximum) that I was in the sick room, I found a dead hamster. I also found a dead hamster in the new arrivals room. She was a tortoise-shell hamster. Cause of death unknown—she didn't seem to have wet tail. PetSmart is an operation of never-ending deaths; it's unbelievably disturbing.
Monday, November 6, 2006
In the sick room, I found five animals dead this morning: Cage 5—Short-haired hamster (tan), isolated November 5 with wet tail Cage 10—Panda hamster, isolated October 24 with wet tail Cage 11—Honey hamster, isolated October 26 with wet tail Cage 15—Two of the four hamsters were dead—one with wet tail, the other diarrhea. Both isolated at 8 a.m., found dead at 7 p.m. I tried to take the hamster in cage 2 to the vet, but the hamster wasn't there. Noted on her chart that she needs vet attention immediately. She was isolated October 23 for wet tail; she is very frail and weak. If she isn't taken to the vet first thing tomorrow, this is cruelty. I sadly doubt she makes it through the night, though. There needs to be something that can be done for these animals in situations like this. You can't just wait for them to die. They're suffering! The hamster in cage 6 also needs veterinary attention for wet tail, and I wrote this on her chart. Cage 16 didn't even have a dish for water. Fifteen dead animals in the fridge today—mostly hamsters and a bearded dragon.
Thursday, November 9, 2006
I asked A2 about the sick room, and she said that it's pretty much empty now. "We have four about to die," she said. She said the others have all died. I took a box of 15 dead hamsters that were in the fridge to the Banfield freezer. Lots of dead animals in there in various bags and boxes.
Saturday, November 11, 2006
I found the long-haired hamster (cage 16) in the fridge with the winter white (cage 1). They had both died on November 10. The long-haired hamster (cage 15) died this morning. A1 had written on her chart, "7:45 a.m.—barely breathing/unresponsive/dying," and that she refused her meds. "9:15 a.m.—dead."
Friday, November 17, 2006
In the sick room (see chart): Cage 1—Fancy rat Cage 5—Guinea pig Cage 9—Calico hamster (noted as deceased on the chart this morning; she was in the fridge) Cage 13—Robo hamster Cage 14—Winter white hamster still not taken to the vet, although on her chart is noted several times that her mouth sores are getting worse; she's still shaky—I noted again that she needs to see a vet.
Saturday, December 2, 2006
A2 said the bearded dragon in the NAR [new arrivals room] was force-fed today. "He's still doing like crap." I'm not sure that anyone has been trained to force-feed animals. I asked how many baby Russians survived (from the NAR), and she said, "Just one. The other two got wet tail, and the parents killed them. Well, actually, they killed one and broke the back of the other one."
Monday, December 18, 2006
I was talking with A2 about how the majority of birdcages we sell are way too small for any birds. She said they're good for travel, but "that's about it." A2 was in the sick room mocking Geiger (cage 14) as she was screaming, saying, "I hate you, I hate you all." I took some video of hamsters who were eating another hamster in the NAR. Not sure if the hamster died and was then eaten or if she had been eaten alive. She was still warm to the touch when I found her.
Wednesday, December 27, 2006
I asked A2 about what's going on with the finches (regarding the deceased). She has no clue. Referring to the one in the treatment room, "She started having seizures" and then died. She thinks that's what may have happened to the other, instead of drowning as they had originally thought. A2 said the other finches are OK. All the baby owl finches died—she thinks that's because it gets so cold at night.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
I spoke with J. (employee), who transferred from the Washington store, about her thoughts and feelings toward the Manchester store, and she said that we always have an ongoing wet tail problem, we receive really small animals who always get sick, and she has found hamsters half-eaten by their cagemates. Her old store didn't have a vet. They would take their animals to a local vet who "didn't really know anything" about small animals or birds. They had problems with dying cockatiels, especially ones who needed to be hand-fed. Many of them would die. She hates how the store employees would have to diagnose the animals and then just guess medications that may or may not work. She said, "I like animals way too much for this. I don't like playing a vet at work, because I'm not a vet."
PETA's investigator took this honey hamster—who, for nearly a month, suffered in the store's back room from lethargy, dehydration, wet tail, and a respiratory infection—to the vet, but PetSmart's "pet care manager" returned the hamster to the back room before she could be examined. The hamster died three days after being denied veterinary care.
This panda hamster suffered from wet tail and died without receiving veterinary care.
During PETA's undercover investigation of PetSmart store #XXXX, this hamster was found suffering from wet tail and died without receiving veterinary care.
This hamster suffered from wet tail and died without receiving veterinary care.
PETA's investigator took this honey hamster who, for nearly a month, suffered in the store's back room from lethargy, dehydration, wet tail, and a respiratory infection to the vet, but PetSmart's “pet care manager” returned the hamster to the back room before she could be examined. The hamster died three days after being denied veterinary care.
Nanners, a parakeet purchased from PetSmart store #0429 in Geneva, Illinois, suffers from psittacosis;a disease that can be transmitted to humans and may be fatal;and has plucked out all his feathers.
Birds had to drink out of this filthy water bowl that was filled with debris and feathers at PetSmart store #1025 in Las Vegas.
After seeing this bird sleeping on the ground;a clear sign that the bird was in distress;a PetSmart employee at store #0476 in Chicago told a concerned customer not to worry because “they do it all the time” ; PetSmart employees, some of whom are caring and well-intentioned, are not given proper training on bird health and care, and birds suffer the consequences.
Leopard geckos one with an apparent nose injury were kept crowded together in a cage at store #0476 in Chicago.
Animals, especially small animals with delicate immune systems, often don't live past PetSmart's short two-week guarantee.
Jose, a large military macaw, had been living in PetSmart stores for more than a year; almost his entire life when this picture was taken. Even PetSmart admits that large birds like Jose need, at the very least, four hours of interaction daily;a requirement that's impossible to fulfill in a pet store setting.
The excessive bird waste caked on the back of this cage at PetSmart store #1463 in Garfield Heights, Ohio, shows that PetSmart's priority is making money, not taking care of its animals. Birds have extremely sensitive respiratory systems, and dirty living conditions can be deadly for them.
At PetSmart store #0521 in Fairlawn, Ohio, 29 parakeets were crammed together in a cage that wouldn't be adequate for even one bird, yet this is the norm in PetSmart stores across the country. Extreme crowding means that feces and urine will inevitably end up in the birds' food, which is kept below the perches. This can make birds sick
Gracie Smart, an African grey parrot purchased from PetSmart store #0642 in Knoxville, Tennessee, was left to pluck and mutilate herself until she bled before PetSmart discounted her 50 percent.
Birds From PetSmart May Kill You
Killer birds from PetSmart. It sounds like a reimagined version of Hitchcock's The Birds or maybe Troma's follow-up film to Poultrygeist, but it's a true, tragic story. A bird-loving family from Corpus Christi, Texas, reportedly lost their beloved father—and the daughter almost lost her life—after they both contracted psittacosis from a cockatiel whom they had purchased at PetSmart and named Peachy. Check out the Associated Press Article here if you don't want to take my word for it.
Peachy, who also died, allegedly from this "parrot fever," was bred at Rainbow World Exotics, a breeding mill that PETA recently investigated, where we found rampant abuse and neglect of small animals and exotic birds. Bird-breeding facilities such as Rainbow World Exotics are no different than puppy mills—they're massive animal factories that crank out birds with no regard for their health, happiness, or individual best interests. It doesn't just hurt the birds when unsanitary, inhumane conditions are the norm.
The good news is that this heroic and forever scarred family is now standing up to PetSmart and demanding an end to the sale of all birds.
Wegmans still sells eggs from its former egg facility, where hens are crowded into tiny, barren cages, allowing each hen less than half a square foot of space. These animals are forced to live in their own waste and on top of the corpses of their cage-mates. A team of investigators from Compassionate Consumers found hens at Wegmans Egg Farm with severe infections and suffering from extreme dehydration. Some hens were trapped in the mesh of their cages, and others were drowning in liquid manure.
The cruel battery cage system used to produce Wegmans brand eggs has been banned in the European Union, and many food service companies, universities, and national grocery chains such as Whole Foods and Wild Oats have pledged to no longer sell or use battery cage eggs. Please seek out alternatives to battery cage eggs, and ask Wegmans to work with The Humane Society of the United States to improve these inhumane conditions.
In 2004, a team of investigators from Compassionate Consumers visited Wegmans Egg Farm in Wolcott, NY. The facility is the largest of its kind in New York State, housing 750,000 egg-laying hens. Investigators found hens subjected to egregiously inhumane conditions much like those documented at other large-scale egg farms across the United States.
CONFINEMENT At Wegmans Egg Farm hens spend their entire lives in barren, wire cages called battery cages. Battery cages allow each chicken a floor space no bigger than a 8.5 x 11 piece of paper. Crowded conditions make it impossible for these animals to act out even their most basic natural behaviors. They cannot properly spread their wings, perch, dust-bathe or preen their feathers. Hens at Wegmans Egg Farm constantly stand on a wire mesh floor and barely have enough room to walk.
Housing chickens in this way is industry standard. Even though Wegmans claims to surpass this industry standard, it is simply not possible to house chickens humanely in battery cages. Battery cages have already been banned in the European Union. Unfortunately, in the U.S. there are few laws protecting farmed animals and even less protecting chickens and other birds. So it is up to the egg industry to regulate themself. And it is up to consumers to stop the cruel use of battery cages. ILLNESS & INJURY With less than 60 employees overseeing the 750,000 animals at Wegmans Egg Farm it is no wonder that individual birds are overlooked. Therefore, sick, injured and trapped hens are commonplace at large corporate egg farms like Wegmans. Trapped hens are unable to reach food or water, are trampled by cage-mates, and often die slowly of dehydration, strangulation or injury. Sick and injured hens are denied even the most basic veterinary care and are left to die.
DEATH & CORPSES Sick, injured and trapped hens often die in their cages. Investigators found countless dead hens in many of the cages. These corpses were in various states of decay, many becoming a mess that has fused to the wire cage floor. Others become nothing but bones and feathers. Living hens are forced to live on these rotting corpses.
Angie's Story
A hen walks through the manure at Wegmans Egg Farm
In the sheds we entered at Wegman's Egg Farm, there were long manure pits below the rows of battery cages. Hens who manage to escape from the crowded battery cages often fall through into the pits below. Once there, they have no way to access food or water. Of the hens we found there, some had surrendered to a dark end, sinking into the murk and giving up. In such a terrible place, this reaction is hardly a surprise. Some of the hens, though, showed us that they had resolved to survive.
Angie was one of those hens. We saw her soon after entering the pits, slowly making her way along the top of a tall manure pile. Without hesitating, Melanie showed impressive balance and agility as she moved to scoop her up. Angie saw her coming and tried to scoot away quickly, but was hindered by the fact that her feet and legs were encased in solid dried manure. Only a couple of toenails were visible at the ends of her 'boots'.
Hens on their way to their new homes
Through the entire ride to her new home, Angie periodically stomped her muck-covered feet inside the plastic carrier. It sounded like someone rapping on a door, the manure on her feet was so hard. She backed up and stomped harder the first time I reached in to give her some water and food, then slowly inched forward to investigate the offerings. When she recognized the water, she drank all of it and seemed to look for more, so I opened the carrier again to add some. Again, she stomped, backed up, then came forward, but this time with a more confident movement toward the water and my hand. She drank, ate, then settled back into the corner.
Angie looked otherwise healthy
Her body condition was surprisingly good, considering where she had been. She didn't look terribly underweight and unlike most of the birds in the cages, she had very little feather loss. Other than the fact that she could barely walk because of the manure immobilizing her feet, she seemed to have taken care of herself very well in a very unlikely situation.
Her feet needed soaking to free up the manure . . .
When we reached the place that would be Angie's new home, she had to endure the unpleasant ordeal of having her feet cleaned off. Closer inspection revealed that the material cemented onto her would have to be soaked before it would come off. After soaking in a mixture of hydrogen peroxide and water, hoof trimmers and other tools had to be used in order to carefully cut the debris from her feet. After about fifteen minutes, Angie's feet and legs were her own again and she was ready to take her first steps. When she was released, she quickly righted herself and lifted her right leg to take a step, then froze.
. . . and horse hoof trimmers cut off the manure.
She seemed truly astonished, holding her foot in the air and bending her neck to inspect it carefully from all angles. After a very long moment, she began to lower it, ever so slowly, and placed her foot flat on the straw. She looked down again and almost lost her balance. After living with her 'boots' for so long, she didn't recognize the sensation of her foot on the ground, and no doubt had never felt a surface of clean straw with those feet, accustomed to the wire mesh floor of a battery cage. My heart welled up as I watched her find her balance and quicken her pace until she was running across the straw to rejoin the other hens.
Angie's first steps
We don't know how long she spent in the manure pits, but it obviously took a great deal of time to accumulate that much hardened manure on her feet. I wonder what all those days were like for her there, struggling through the quicksand of the manure pits, surviving because of her tenacious refusal to give up and die. I am so grateful for the message Angie brings about perseverance and personal strength. She is a beautiful soul, now spending her days pecking outside, dustbathing, and walking confidently on solid ground.
Phoenix's Story
Holding onto the wall, I carefully reached one leg down, feeling for a solid place to stand between the piles and puddles of putrid manure. I looked up at my hands; the beetles that covered the wall were beginning to crawl onto them. As I dropped to the floor, sinking into the muck, I looked into the dark abyss of the manure pits stretching out below the battery cages at Wegmans Egg Farm in Wolcott, NY.
The manure pits were dark and disgusting
The blackness was punctuated by white feathers drifting until they stuck on the tar-like surface of a wall, beam, or manure pile. I felt paralyzed momentarily, scanning the ground for a solid place to step and finding none. On every feather-covered pile of feces, there were solid masses of the shiny black beetles. There was no place to look away from the abhorrent scenery. The hot, dense air did nothing to ease my discomfort and the knowledge that I was inhaling chemicals like ammonia and methane didn't help either. Finally, I shifted my weight and tested a spot, stepped forward, and found myself ankle-deep. I realized that there was no easy way through. Adam, Melanie and I trudged toward the ladder leading up to the cage level, often stopping to free a foot from the gripping suction of the muck.
Phoenix sinks into the manure
Slight movement on the ground, more urgent than that of the amoeboid insect swarms, caught my eye. All that was visible was a hen's head and neck, weakly bobbing and stretching to keep her open beak from being submerged in a puddle of black ooze. Our careful footsteps were forgotten as Mel and I moved toward her. She barely moved as Mel squatted and carefully pulled her from the muck. She looked like an oil spill victim. Only her head and neck were distinguishable as parts of a chicken. Her feathers, wings, and legs were a single mass of sticky black glue. I poured some water into a container and extended it uselessly, then offered a few drops through a syringe. The hen didn't seem to notice. Her beak opened over and over, trying to pull in a breath that would not come. I felt my own throat grow tight and tears came to my eyes. I opened the door of a carrier and Mel eased her in backwards, laying her limp body inside.
Hours later, when we arrived back in Rochester, she still had not moved. Determined that she would rise from her would-be grave and survive to see a life of sunlight and open space, I had given her the name Phoenix. My assertions to her about her survival were met only with weakening gasps for breath. As I waited on hold with the emergency vet, I saw that her exhausted body had let go; that gasping beak had finally closed.
Sadly, Phoenix did not survive the ride home.
I looked at my hands as I hung up the phone, let them fall back to my lap. I was thankful that Phoenix had not disappeared into the manure pits at Wegmans Egg Farm. She held on long enough to share her story with me and with others who can help all the hens who were left behind. — Megan Cosgrove
Expert Opinions on Wegmans' Practices
“In no way can these living conditions meet the demands of a complex nervous system designed to form a multitude of memories and make complex decisions.” —Lesley Rogers, Ph.D., on battery cages, author of The Development of Brain and Behaviour in the Chicken
Wegmans, as a member of United Egg Producers (UEP), tries to defend the inhumane practices at its egg facility as scientifically sound. Yet the company ignores credible, scientific research that suggests standard practices in the egg industry cause unnecessary animal suffering. These practices include crowding birds into barren cages with no opportunity to exhibit natural tendencies such as nesting, roosting, or dust bathing; starving birds to induce another laying cycle; and mutilating their beaks without painkiller.
Compiled on this page are relevant quotes from expert scientists and veterinarians, as well as The Humane Society of the United States. This collection of quotes was originally published at EggScam.com.
* Joy Mench, Ph.D. * Ian Duncan, Ph.D. * Lesley J. Rogers, Ph.D. * Michael Baxter, Ph.D. * Michael Appleby, Ph.D. * Temple Grandin, Ph.D. * Eric Dunayer, DVM * Christopher Patterson, DVM * The Humane Society of the United States
Joy Mench, Ph.D.
Dr. Mench on Battery Cages (UEP guidelines, which Wegmans follows, recommend barren battery cages.)
Notes: In November Wegmans announced that it would be working with Dr. Mench over the next year and that she will, "examine [its] egg farm operation and make recommendations for improvement if necessary." Dr. Mench sat on the UEP’s advisory committee for its animal welfare guidelines, which recommend 67 square inches of cage space per bird for white laying hens, an amount of space Dr. Mench calls “meager”:
* “The recommended space allowance for laying hens in some countries is 60-80 square inches per hen, barely enough for the hen to turn around and not enough for her to perform normal comfort behaviors; however, many hens are allowed less than even that meager amount.”
* “Battery cages provide an inadequate environment for nesting, lacking both sites which fit these criteria [concealment and separation from other birds] as well as substrates for nest-building. Hens housed in battery cages display agitated pacing and escape behaviors which last for 2 to 4 hours prior to oviposition.”
* “A different decision about the minimum recommendation would have been reached had the committee given more weight to the information from the preference testing and use of space studies, since these indicate that hens need and want more space than 72 square inches.”
Dr. Mench on “Beak Trimming” (Wegmans cuts off the tips of hens' beaks without painkiller.)
* “There is mounting evidence that beak trimming also results in behavioral and neurophysiological changes indicative of acute and chronic pain. … Both beak trimmed chicks and adults display difficulty in grasping and swallowing feed even when their pecking rates are high.”
Mench: “Chickens explore their environment with their beaks. They like to pick things up, and that’s their main way of exploring and touching and feeling things.”
NPR: “So, cutting off the beak is a big deal, if you’re a hen?”
Mench: “It’s definitely a big deal.”
Dr. Mench on Forced Molting (Wegmans follows UEP guidelines, which do not prohibit forced molting.)
* “The bird is starved. Yes, the bird is starved. I don’t like to see hungry animals not being given food.”
* “Feed restriction and deprivation can thus lead to boredom and the development of stereotypies and vices.”
Ian Duncan, Ph.D.
Dr. Duncan on Battery Cages (UEP guidelines, which Wegmans follows, recommend barren battery cages.)
* “Hens in battery cages are prevented from performing several natural behaviour patterns. … The biggest source of frustration is undoubtedly the lack of nesting opportunity.”
* “The lack of physical space may actually prevent them from adopting certain postures or performing particular behaviours.”
* “[T]he difficulty of inspecting cages means that the welfare of the birds is at some risk.”
* “The lack of space in battery cages reduces welfare by preventing hens from adopting certain postures—such as an erect posture with the head raised—and performing particular behaviors—such as wing-flapping.”
* “Battery cages for laying hens have been shown (by me and others) to cause extreme frustration particularly when the hen wants to lay an egg. Battery cages are being phased out in Europe and other more humane husbandry systems are being developed.”
Dr. Duncan on “Beak Trimming” (Wegmans cuts off the tips of hens' beaks without painkiller.)
* “There is now good morphological, neurophysical, and behavioral evidence that beak trimming leads to both chronic and acute pain.”
* “[Beak trimming] has been shown (by me and by others) to cause both acute and chronic pain and should not be allowed to be carried out routinely. It has been banned in some European countries and they have shown that it is possible to keep hens without de-beaking them.”
Dr. Duncan on Forced Molting (Wegmans follows UEP guidelines, which do not prohibit forced molting.)
* “[T]he evidence suggests that hens suffer enormously during forced molting.”
* “[Forced molting] is a barbaric practice which doubles mortality in the flock while it is going and leads to great suffering in all the hens involved.”
Lesley J. Rogers, Ph.D.
Dr. Rogers on Battery Cages (UEP guidelines, which Wegmans follows, recommend barren battery cages.)
Referring to battery cages, Dr. Rogers writes:
* “In no way can these living conditions meet the demands of a complex nervous system designed to form a multitude of memories and make complex decisions.”
Dr. Rogers on Chickens
* “With increased knowledge of the behaviour and cognitive abilities of the chicken, has come the realization that the chicken is not an inferior species to be treated merely as a food source.”
Michael Baxter, Ph.D.
Dr. Baxter on Battery Cages (UEP guidelines, which Wegmans follows, recommend barren battery cages.)
* “The space available in a battery cage does not allow hens even to stand still in the way they would in a more spacious environment. Some behaviours are completely inhibited by confinement in a cage causing a progressive accumulation of motivation to perform the behaviours.”
* “When crowded together this regulatory system breaks down and the hens appear to be in a chronic state of social stress, perpetually trying to get away from their cagemates, not able to express dominance relations by means of spacing and not even able to resolve social conflict by means of aggression.”
* “The frustration of nesting motivation is likely to cause significant suffering to the hen during the prelaying period every day.”
* “Hens without access to perches may have more welfare problems resulting from increased aggression, reduced bone strength, impaired foot condition and higher feather loss.”
* “The fact that hens are restricted from exercising to such an extent that they are unable to maintain the strength of their bones is probably the greatest single indictment of the battery cage. The increased incidence of bone breakage which results is a serious welfare insult.”
Michael Appleby, Ph.D.
Dr. Appleby on the UEP Guidelines
* “We believe the egg industry still has a long way to go before they can claim to be treating animals humanely. … The proposal put forth recognizes that animal welfare is a consideration, but it fails to address the worst abuses that are standard practice in the egg industry.”
Temple Grandin, Ph.D.
Dr. Grandin on the "Animal Care Certified" standards (which have recently been replaced with "United Egg Producers Certified"):
* “[Grandin] said the egg industry is improving, but the new standards are too weak.”
“Some of these people have forgotten a hen is a live animal,” Grandin said. “This is what happens when people get totally desensitized to suffering.”
Grandin said the industry is still held back by old-guard, animals-as-machines views that are standing in the way of more progressive approaches. She said in many cases, hens are still crammed so tight in cages they can't lie down.
Dr. Grandin on the Egg Industry
* “When I visited a large egg layer operation and saw old hens that had reached the end of their productive life, I was horrified. Egg layers bred for maximum egg production and the most efficient feed conversion were nervous wrecks that had beaten off half their feathers by constant flapping against the cage. …
“Some egg producers got rid of old hens by suffocating them in plastic bags or dumpsters. The more I learned about the egg industry the more disgusted I got. Some of the practices that had become “normal” for this industry were overt cruelty. Bad had become normal. Egg producers had become desensitized to suffering.
“There is a point where economics alone must not be the sole justification for an animal production practice. When the egg producers asked me if I wanted cheap eggs I replied, ‘Would you want to buy a shirt if it was $5 cheaper and made by child slaves?’ Hens are not human but research clearly shows that they feel pain and can suffer.”
Dr. Grandin on Male Chicks (UEP guidelines, and Wegmans, are silent on male chicks.)
* “One of first things she did was tour a chicken hatchery. She asked a worker what he did with the boxes of cull baby chicks. She was told the worker who looked after them was on vacation.
* ‘Ya sure,’ I said. ‘I know what you’re doing with them and it’s going to stop,’” she said.
* “They were throwing live animals in the dumpster to get rid of them. I was going ‘What? They were doing what?’ Nobody would throw a live calf in a dumpster. These people forgot this is a live animal.”
Eric Dunayer, DVM
Dr. Dunayer on the UEP Guidelines
* “In the end, the UEP’s guidelines do little more than codify already present industry practices. The proposed increase in space allotted to each chicken is both insignificant and falls well short of the area a chicken needs to carry out her normal behaviors.”
Christopher Patterson, DVM
Dr. Patterson on the UEP Guidelines
* “The UEP’s attempt to address welfare concerns in laying flocks and to standardize husbandry practices is meager at best. Even though some useful recommendations are made, in most cases they are so vague and riddled with loopholes, that practically any egg producer could be “Animal Care Certified.” My biggest concern is how this certification program will mislead consumers into believing that they are buying eggs from producers that treat hens humanely.”
The Humane Society of the United States
* “The United Egg Producers is not tackling the systematic abuses within the industry that severely compromise the welfare of individual birds. … [The UEP guidelines] seem designed more to mollify consumers than to address the extreme animal welfare abuses that have become the norm in this industry.”
Compassion Over Killing has been relentless in its efforts to reveal the cruelty in the egg industry. Focused on Maryland facilities owned by major companies—such as ISE America, County Fair Farms, and Red Bird Egg Farm—Compassion Over Killing’s investigations have exposed the egg industry’s true colors.
Egg-laying hens are the most intensively confined animals on today’s factory farms. They are severely overcrowded in small wire cages, unable to even flap their wings. Many have parts of their beaks burned off without painkiller to reduce the impact of stress-induced aggression, and hens may also be starved for up to two weeks—losing up to 30 percent of their bodyweight—to jolt their bodies into a new laying cycle.
COK’s investigators have documented the conditions at many major egg producers.
Pennsylvania Court Finds that Animal Abuse on Egg Factory Farm is Legal
Acquittal in Cruelty Case Further Demonstrates that the Foxes Are Guarding the Factory Farm Henhouse
On June 1, 2007, a Lancaster County judge acquitted a Pennsylvania egg factory farm owner and manager of animal cruelty charges, essentially re-writing state cruelty law to find that abuse is perfectly legal as long as it is committed against farmed animals.
“This ruling reveals that—under this judge’s opinion—farm animals in Pennsylvania have no legal protection from the horrific conditions that were clearly documented inside this egg factory farm” stated Erica Meier, executive director of Washington, D.C.-based Compassion Over Killing (COK). “This court may have acquitted these two defendants, but the court of public opinion is certainly turning against the egg industry and its cruel practices.”
The verdict was handed down after a trial in which the court was presented with undercover video evidence revealing appalling conditions for hens in the facility. The footage was gathered by a COK investigator who was employed at Esbenshade in late 2005, then presented to Pennsylvania-certified humane officer Johnna Seeton of the Pennsylvania Legislative Animal Network (PLAN) who subsequently filed 70 counts of criminal animal cruelty against the owner and manager of the farm. See Background section below for more detail.
According to COK’s general counsel Cheryl Leahy, “If these animals had been dogs or cats, there’s little doubt this case would have resulted in a conviction. There is a clear double standard here, and that hypocrisy is troubling.”
Background
From November 30 to December 9, 2005, an investigator affiliated with Compassion Over Killing worked undercover at Esbenshade Farms, one of the nation’s top egg producers, located in Mount Joy, Pennsylvania. While there, he documented appalling conditions for hundreds of thousands of hens including:
birds overcrowded in wire cages so small, they cannot spread their wings,
hens left to suffer from untreated illnesses or injuries,
birds with their wings, legs, or feet entangled in the wires of cages, unable to access food or water,
injured or dying birds removed from their cages and left in the aisles without access to food or water,
birds impaled on the wires of the cages with many found already dead as a result of the painful immobilization, and
hens living in cages amongst decomposing bodies of other birds.
The Factory Farm
Esbenshade Farms–North in Mount Joy, Penn.
Each shed has several rows of cages stacked up to four tiers high.
Many birds are covered in feces that fall from the cages above.
Sick, Injured, and Immobilized Hens
This hen’s wing is stuck under the feeding rail.
Her beak is caught in the wires of the cage floor.
This bird’s toe is entangled in the wires of cage floor.
She’s unable to free her wing, which is caught in the wires of the cage.
This injured hen was removed from her cage and left to die in the aisle of the shed.
Death
This hen’s beak got caught on a wire hook near the water dispenser.
Dead birds are often left in cages with hens.
Another dead bird whose beak is caught on a wire hook.
Live birds are often forced to live amongst their dead cage-mates.
Dead hens are collected in shopping carts every day.
Excerpts from the Investigator’s Log Notes
Every day the investigator worked at Esbenshade Farms, he kept log notes. Below are excerpts from those notes.
Friday, November 18, 2005
I … was given a short tour of the facility and packing plant. Each of the seven houses is at least as long as a football field, and the cages are stacked four tiers high, running down the length of the building. An estimated 550,000 to 600,000 birds are kept at this Esbenshade facility.
As we walked into house #1, I noticed a strong ammonia odor in the air that was thick with dust. I saw a few dead birds lying in the aisles between the rows of cages
Wednesday, November 30, 2005
I arrived at the farm at 5:25 a.m. for my first day of work. … At no time today did I receive any verbal or written instructions about proper animal handling nor any protocols on what to do with injured or dying birds. The only animal-related instruction I received was … regarding live birds who were out of their cages: [I was] told … to try to catch any live birds who had escaped from the cages and were roaming in the aisles and to “stuff” them back into a cage.
I noticed that most of the birds were de-beaked and overcrowded with as many as nine others in a single cage. Some were covered in excrement that had fallen from the cage above. Several birds were stuck under the feeding rail, and it was difficult to free their immobilized necks, wings, legs, and other body parts trapped by the cages. I also saw birds in the aisles—some mobile with others unable to stand, lying down with their legs splayed out behind them.
The procedure for dealing with dead birds was relayed to me as follows: Dead birds are removed from cages, thrown onto the floor of the aisles between rows of cages, later collected in shopping carts, then put into garbage bags (ten birds per bag), and stored in freezers in the manure pits below the houses. I was told that on Thursdays, the dead bodies are loaded onto a dump truck and sent to a rendering plant. [He] said that the dump truck is completely full of dead birds at the end of loading each week.
Throughout the day, I removed approximately 300 dead birds from cages and collected several more who were lying in the aisles of house #5.
After working in house #5 for a few hours, I then went into house #3, as assigned, and removed approximately 25 dead birds from cages, again following the protocol.
In both houses, I saw dead birds in various stages of decomposition in cages with live birds. Some were bloated and their skin had turned black. Others appeared bloody, and several were little more than skeletal remains. In some cases, I found dead birds with parts of their bodies caught in between the wires of the cages or even pierced by broken wires, clearly having been unable to access food or water. In order to remove one dead bird from a cage, I had to unhook the lower part of her beak that was speared on a loose wire hanging just above the cage.
I asked … what I should do if I find birds who are not yet dead but appear to be dying in their cages. He said that those birds will most likely die soon and their bodies may slide onto the egg belt causing jams and delays. He explained that dying birds should be pulled out of their cages to prevent this. However, he did not explain what to do with these dying birds upon removing them from the cage.
The stench inside these houses was overpowering at times. In addition to the ammonia emitted from the manure pits below and the decomposing bodies inside many of the cages, there are many broken, rotting eggs. What seemed like thousands of flies swarmed inside the houses.
Thursday, December 1, 2005
Last night, I couldn’t wash away the stench of manure, ammonia, and decaying chickens. It seemed to be all over me. I had a difficult time breathing, probably from all the dust in the houses that had made its way into my lungs despite the dust mask I had worn. I coughed throughout the night and got little sleep.
Upon arriving at the farm this morning, I started removing dead birds from cages in house #5 and found a hen who appeared to be dying. Her cage-mates were walking all over her, so I removed her from the cage and started carrying her to the end of the aisle intending to ask … a co-worker what to do with her. Before I reached the end of the aisle, however, she died in my arms. I placed her body next to the other dead birds I had already removed from other cages. Altogether, I collected about 70 to 80 dead hens in that house today.
In just my first two days working at Esbenshade, I have found several live birds whose wings or entire bodies were stuck under the feeding rails. Today, I found a bird with both of her wings caught in the wires of the cage, which forced her to put her head down onto the egg conveyor belt. The fact that these cages are in such disrepair may help explain why so many birds are getting stuck—I’ve noticed loose or protruding wires in many of the cages.
The truck came today to pick up all the dead birds collected over the past week and take them to a rendering plant. Our job is to empty the garbage bags filled with dead birds onto a Bobcat skid loader. The birds are then dumped into the back of the truck. By the time we were done, there must have been hundreds and hundreds of birds piled up in that truck.
I am surprised that there are a large number of cats inside the houses. Many appear to be sick with discharge leaking from their eyes, and some seem to have either broken limbs or old fractures that healed incorrectly. Some of the more social cats follow me in the aisles and even jump up on the feeding rails while I’m removing dead hens from cages. Today in house #5, I saw a two cats ripping apart and eating a dead bird. This is especially troubling considering that these dead and dying birds are apparently suffering from some illness …
Friday, December 2, 2005
I worked in houses #3 and #5 again today and found many more birds stuck in the wires of their cages. Three birds had their wings caught under the feeding rail. I had difficulty freeing them, and they all appeared to have minor injuries as a result of being entangled. I also found several birds with their toes or overgrown nails stuck in between metal clips or wires. Their nails grow so long that they sometimes become lodged in all the little crevices in the cage. I also found an immobilized bird who was being trampled by her cage-mates. She was lethargic, presumably from lack of food and water, and couldn’t even stand once I freed her from the wires.
I again asked … what to do with birds who appear to be injured or dying. He said that if the bird looks like she will still be productive, I was to leave her in the cage. For those who look like they will not survive, he said to remove them. I followed up by asking what I was supposed to do with them once I take them out of the cage. [He] replied that I was to hold their bodies tight and pull their necks to dislocate the spine. He warned me not to pull off their heads, though, because blood gets everywhere. He quickly showed me this process just once using a dead bird.
Today, I removed about 35 dead hens from cages. I didn’t get a chance to spend more time checking on the birds—I’m in charge of monitoring about 170,000 birds each day—because I had to deal with a number of mechanical problems. There were a lot of jams during egg collection due to birds getting stuck under the feeding rails and blocking the belts. The belts and cages themselves also cause many of the problems. It seemed like an unending battle. I have to either skip my breaks or cut them short in order to make sure I can keep up with all of the egg jams that occur. Otherwise, after returning from a break, I’m likely to find an aisle full of overflowing, broken eggs.
Saturday, December 3, 2005
Again, I worked in houses #3 and #5 today. In all, I removed nearly 100 dead birds from cages. In house #5, I found another dead bird hanging by her beak which had been pierced on a wire hook at the top of the cage. I also found more birds who were stuck under the feeding rails, and some whose feet were entangled in the wires of the cages. One bird’s toe was caught between a wire bar and a metal clip. After I freed her, I saw that her toe was caked in dried blood, but was able to stand. Another hen had somehow gotten her beak stuck between two wires on the floor of her cage. She was unable to move. I also picked up a bird who I thought was dead because she was too weak even to stand or move, preventing her from accessing food or water in the cage.
Each worker here is responsible for monitoring between 120,000 to 170,000 hens every day. Even if we had no other duties, it would be impossible to check on each bird or even thoroughly look inside each cage. As I noted yesterday, there are so many mechanical problems (primarily with the egg collection system) to attend to that there is even less time to look after the birds. I try to spend as much time as possible looking for birds stuck in the wires of their cages and removing dead birds from cages with live hens, but there simply is not enough time in the day.
Sunday, December 4, 2005
I pulled about 70 dead birds from house #5 and 20 from house #3. In just four days, I have found countless birds, both dead and alive, stuck in their cages, unable to reach food or water. Today, as on previous days, I found:
* a dead bird with her beak impaled on a wire hook used to hold up the water pipe; * a dead bird impaled on a loose wire that had come apart from the cage; * a dead bird with her leg stuck in the wires of the cage floor; * a dead bird whose head was caught between two wires at the top of the cage, hanging by her throat; * several live birds trapped under the feeding rail and * several more birds whose feet and/or toes were entangled in the wires of their cages.
I also found a bird whose wing was pierced on protruding wires. She was forced to lie on the floor of the cage—a few eggs, unable to roll onto the conveyor, were piling up behind her. After I pulled her wing from the wires, I bent the wires so they weren’t a danger.
Tuesday, December 6, 2005
I worked in houses #3 and #5 again and removed approximately 24 dead birds out of house #5 and 15 from #3. As I walked through house #3, I found two birds lying in the aisles—both were still alive but suffering with what appeared to be broken wings and neither could stand. Outside of cages, the birds had no access to food or water. I asked … why these two birds were in the aisles, and he said that some of the workers who find birds dying in the cages take them out because they don’t want the egg belts to jam. But, because they don’t like to kill the birds, they just leave them in the aisles. … He also mentioned that sometimes, if a bird is injured, some of the workers will place her in an empty cage, which they refer to as the “hospital.” I asked if there is anything else that can be done for injured birds and he replied, “No.”
I found more birds caught under the feeding rails today, as well as a bird with her toe caught in a metal clip. Another bird died after her beak got caught on a wire hook at the top of the cage. Every time I find a bird who died like this, I try to bend the wires to prevent it from happening again, but there seem to be a lot of cages with these exposed hooks.
Wednesday, December 7, 2005
Today I started working in house #1. … The stench inside #1 is really nauseating. I removed 104 dead birds from cages, and nearly half of them were severely decomposed. … Many of these dead birds had their wings or feet entangled in the wires of the cage. I found one dead hen who had an egg still partially inside her body.
Nearly all of the birds in house #1 have severe feather-loss. And, as in houses #3 and #5, I found several birds whose wings got wedged between the feeding rails and the wires of the cages. It took several minutes to free each bird I came across in this immobilized position.
Thursday, December 8, 2005
I removed 35 dead birds from house #5 and 52 from #1. Once again, I found more live hens entangled in the wires of their cage.
Since it’s Thursday, the rendering truck came to the farm to collect the dead birds we had pulled throughout the previous week. There were so many dead birds to be picked up this time that the truck had to make two trips. At one point, [a co-worker] and I went into one of the houses to get more trash bags filled with dead birds and saw a live bird sitting on a pile of trash bags. [He] grabbed the hen by her tail feathers and legs and tossed her toward the door where the Bobcat skid loader was parked. She squawked, fluttered, and landed harshly on the concrete floor. [They] started laughing.
While monitoring the houses today, I found a bird who couldn’t raise her head. She was clearly unable to access food or water and was getting stomped on by her cage-mates. I pulled her out of the cage and placed her on the floor to better assess her condition. She was able to walk, though she was wobbly. As she took a few steps backwards, unable to walk forwards, her head dragged on the ground.
Although I had spent a lot of time yesterday looking for dead birds in house #1, I found a number of severely decomposed corpses today.
Choose Egg-Free Foods: The best way each of us can help laying hens is to leave their eggs out of our shopping carts.
