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.
Quali sostanze nutrizionali potranno mai fornire delle uova prodotte all'interno di veri e propri lager per animali? Per la salute e il rispetto del mondo animale, fai molta attenzione al codice riportato!
Oggi il 90% delle uova in Italia è ottenuto da galline IMPRIGIONATE A "VITA" negli allevamenti in batteria, in gabbie di metallo, così PICCOLE DA NON RIUSCIRE NEANCHE A MUOVERE LE ALI, che dovrebbero essere eliminate o notevolmente ampliate e modificate a partire dal 2012, secondo quanto stabilito da una normativa dell'Unione Europea.
Un codice alfa numerico identifica ogni uovo: il primo numero Indica la tipologia di allevamento
0 = biologico (1 gallina per 10 metri quadrati su terreno all'aperto, con vegetazione)
1 = all'aperto (1 gallina per 2,5 metri quadrati su terreno all'aperto, con vegetazione)
2 = a terra (7 galline per 1 metro quadrato su terreno COPERTO di PAGLIA 0 SABBIA) - CAPANNONI PRIVI DI FINESTRE e luce sempre accesa!
3 = IN GABBIA (25 GALLINE PER METRO QUADRATO IN POSATOI CHE OFFRONO 15 CM . PER GALLINA) - UNA SCATOLA Di SCARPE PER TUTTA LA LORO VITA
A terra dentro capannoni
In gabbia dentro capannoni
Le seconde due lettere indicano il paese di provenienza o codice dello stato (1T" Italia). Le tre cifre successive indicano il codice ISTAT dei comune dove è ubicato l’allevamento e le due lettere vicine la provincia di produzione. Un numero progressivo di tre cifre consente di identificare in modo univoco l'allevamento di provenienza in cui la gallina ha deposto l'uovo. Può essere, inoltre, aggiunta una lettera (A..2) in coda al numero distintivo per l'identificazione dei singoli branchi di galline ovaiole o dei diversi locali dell'allevamento nei quali esse "soggiornano". Numerose ricerche hanno evidenziato un maggiore contenuto di acido folico e di vitamina B2 nelle uova provenienti da galline allevate all'aperto, rispetto a quelle ottenute in allevamenti intensivi.
Questo articolo è datato, ma purtroppo molto attuale!
Guglielmo Donadello, consulente aziendale settore zootecnico e agroalimentare (Liberazione, 19 novembre 2000)
Che cos’è oggi il pollo da carne? Stiamo parlando di broiler. Tutti i polli che compriamo e mangiamo, in tutto il mondo, sono oramai solo di un paio di razze ibride (denominate COBB 500, i cui brevetti sono in mano alla The Cobb Breeding Company LTD), nate nei segreti laboratori di genetica applicata, selezionate esclusivamente per l’ingrassaggio. Il risultato di queste selezioni è una vera macchina biologica ad elevatissimo “indice di conversione”: un broiler mangia un chilo e mezzo di mangime e ne “produce” uno di carne. Lo fanno vivere solo 35 giorni (non ha neanche il tempo per diventare pazzo). Questi polli denominati “galletti” quando arrivano a “maturazione” pesano vivi in media sui 2,3 chili e preparati a busto circa 1,2. Per avere queste rese così elevate e cicli biologici così accelerati servono allevamenti e mangimi adatti.
Come vengono allevati Si chiama allevamento integrato. Assoggettato, cioè, alla filiera industriale della produzione di carne, le cui principali fasi sono: produzione della gallina ovaiola, incubatoi delle uova, produzione dei pulcini, magnifici, macelli, industria di lavorazione, logistica, commercializzazione nella rete della grande distribuzione organizzata. Nel nostro paese due aziende controllano oltre il 70% del mercato. Una è l’AIA del gruppo Veronesi e l’altra è del gruppo Amadori. L’allevamento viene svolto in grandi capannoni dove possono stare decine di migliaia di volatili: con una densità di 10-15 per metroquadro, sino a 30 chili di “carne” a mq. (I regolamenti UE per gli allevamenti biologici stabiliscono in tre polli per metro quadrato la densità massima ammissibile). Beccano tutto ciò che ha colore paglierino, giorno e notte, grazie all’illuminazione artificiale. Le temperature sono sempre elevate (anche a causa della luce e delle deiezioni, che vengono raccolte con una ruspa per la produzione della pollina, sottoprodotto usato come concime agricolo o combustibile; e fino a 10 anni fa come mangime per bovini da ingrasso). Le condizioni igieniche sono terribili. Gli animali vivono dal primo all’ultimo giorno della loro brevissima vita calpestando e dormendo sulle loro deiezioni. Le infezioni batteriologiche sono contrastate dal primo all’ultimo giorno di vita con gli antibiotici contenuti nei mangimi; ma per i virus – come si sa – non ci sono farmaci. Da qui l’uso di vaccini che, come è noto, creano una quantità di anticorpi che contrastano l’estrinsecazione delle manifestazioni patologiche del virus, ma impediscono la eradicazione dello stesso, consentendo che animali solo apparentemente sani siano commercializzati: con il rischio che il virus si trasferisca dall’animale all’uomo. A questo si aggiunge il rumore spaventoso provocato dal pigolare di 50.000 – 100.000 animali spaventati, tenuti in quelle condizioni. L’organismo del broiler, che è pur sempre un animale diurno, viene messo a dura prova, l’apparato digerente stressato, la sua capacità di resistenza agli agenti patogeni fortemente indebolita. Nel territorio dove sono inseriti, senza un minimo di criterio di biosicurezza, questi allevamenti sono delle vere e proprie bombe batteriologiche, pericolose e costose per tutta la collettività. Pericolose, in quanto incubatoi di possibili virus trasmissibili agli uomini, come salmonelle e influenze; costose, come il caso dell’ultima peste aviaria costata alla sola regione veneta 110 miliardi, e altri 500 allo stato.
Cosa mangiano I polli dovrebbero mangiare mais, soia e fibre. Trasformano proteine vegetali in proteine nobili. I broiler, che rappresentano il 99% dei 520 milioni di polli e dei 22 milioni di tacchini che mangiamo ogni anno, mangiano esclusivamente mangimi industriali, prodotti in larghissima misura da due o tre aziende. Le formule di questi mangimi sono top secret; possono in questo modo metterci dentro di tutto e di più. Il mais e la soia, che sono i componenti principali (fino al 60/70%), sono in grandissima parte di importazione e di produzione transgenetica, perché costano meno. Contrariamente alle normative per i bovini, i mangimi per pollame e tacchini possono contenere farine di carne e di pesce, pannelli di olio esausto, grassi di origine animale. La vicenda di due anni fa dei polli belgi alla diossina è dovuta a un “eccesso” di PCB, ma se sta nei limiti tollerati si può dare da mangiare ai polli anche oli esausti di motori. Ma i risultati migliori si ottengono con le proteine animali derivate dalle interiora, dalle teste, dalle zampe, dalle piume derivate dai loro fratelli morti in precedenza; oltre alle proteine animali acquistate dove costano meno (farine di sangue e di pesce). Ai polli ed ai tacchini ne vengono somministrate una quantità fino al 30% nel tacchino, un po’ meno per il pollo.
Cosa si ottiene Si ottengono dei pulcinotti venduti come galletti o tacchini, con una carne senza gusto né qualità organolettiche, e di dubbia salubrità. I polli così allevati se li cucini due minuti di più letteralmente si sbriciolano, se li lasci raffreddare rilasciano il classico odore di pesce con cui sono stati allevati. Oggi la carne di pollo non viene offerta da nessun ristorante degno di questo nome, viene data solo nelle mense delle fabbriche, delle scuole o per le mense delle famiglie sotto i due milioni al mese. Per i tacchini è ancora peggio: la carne è letteralmente immangiabile. Amadori la tritura, aggiunge un po’ di manzo e propone in questi giorni con la pubblicità i rotoloni di carne “per una buona domenica da passare in famiglia”. Questi rotoli sono fatti con la carne di tacchini con aggiunta di carne di manzo e – come si dice in gergo – con la giusta quantità di aromatizzanti. Nessuno, ad esclusione dei pochi NAS, protegge i consumatori. Nessuno controlla, e i nostri 7000 veterinari pubblici, come da precise istruzioni, guardano, registrano, e alla fine non possono fare altro.
Altro che polli asiatici! Tutta la verità su quelli italiani
Paola Magni e Claudio Vigolo - tratto da www.lifegate.it
Ai microfoni di LifeGate Radio, il Dottor Enrico Moriconi, Presidente dell’Associazione Culturale Veterinari di Salute Pubblica, ha risposto a questa e altre domande
Quali sono le condizioni igieniche negli allevamenti italiani? Le condizioni sono critiche. Siamo in situazione di sovraffollamento. Gli animali vengono tenuti per tutto il periodo della loro vita sulla stessa lettiera, respirano l’ammoniaca che si libera dagli escrementi che loro producono. Hanno uno stato di stress continuo, che deve essere corretto - anche se gli allevatori smentiscono - con la somministrazione di farmaci.
Recenti analisi di laboratorio commissionate da Lav e Il Salvagente hanno evidenziato la presenza di residui di antibiotici in 4 polli italiani su 10… Perché vengono somministrati gli antibiotici e con che frequenza? Gli antibiotici sono la base dell’allevamento intensivo: gli allevamenti intensivi sono storicamente nati nel momento in cui sono stati disponibili grandi quantità di antibiotici. Questi farmaci rendono possibile l’allevamento, altrimenti lo stress, il sovraffollamento, le carenti condizioni igieniche farebbero scoppiare delle malattie. Questi farmaci aumentano la crescita degli animali e contemporaneamente li proteggono da alcune malattie. Nel caso dei virus non servono. Il fatto che l’antibiotico sia somministrato continuativamente, nonostante sia ammesso farlo solo in caso di terapia, è facilmente dimostrabile. Qualche anno fa, ad esempio, ci fu lo scandalo in Gran Bretagna dei polli che venivano rietichettati e venduti anche un mese dopo la reale scadenza. Ebbene, questo fu possibile proprio perché i polli sono pieni di sostanze chimiche che non li fanno “marcire”.
Cosa mangiano i polli italiani negli allevamenti intensivi? Il mangime è principalmente costituito da mais e altri cereali. In più vi sono degli integratori a base di sostanze grasse per favorire la crescita. Anche l’olio esausto, l’olio dai motori delle macchine usato, è ammesso nella dieta dei polli Italiani, che sono considerati come dei “grandi riciclatori”. Molti sottoprodotti sono quindi permessi. Per quanto riguarda mais e soia ogm nei mangimi, non c’è obbligo di etichettatura poi nel pollo. Bisogna dire che chi mangia carne ha una forte possibilità di mangiare proteine geneticamente modificate, proprio perché negli allevamenti non biologici l’uso di mangimi geneticamente modificati è permesso.
Illuminazione artificiale che li tiene 24 ore su 24 alla luce e densità di 15-20 polli per metro quadro… Animali così stressati saranno anche più deboli… L’illuminazione artificiale tende a creare un’atmosfera uniformemente “grigiastra” , perché se ci fosse troppa luce sarebbero acuiti i fenomeni di cannibalismo. In queste condizioni la mortalità degli animali è comunque alta, ma il loro valore commerciale è così basso da non preoccupare particolarmente l’allevatore.
Parlare degli allevamenti intensivi italiani come di “bombe batteriologiche” è esagerato? Le definirei piuttosto “bombe ecologiche”: al problema della presenza di batteri si somma il problema delle deiezioni da smaltire, e quindi dell’eutrofizzazione delle acque e della presenza di nitrati nelle falde acquifere.
Quale strada intraprendere per migliorare la qualità degli allevamenti e prevenire così epidemie come l’influenza aviaria? Bisognerebbe mangiare meno carne o addirittura smettere di mangiarne. Questa risposta può sembrare un po’ estrema ma rende bene l’idea di come per migliorare il benessere – anche di quelli che vogliono mangiare la carne- sia indispensabile per tutti noi abbassarne i consumi.
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.
Imagine spending your entire life crammed into a tiny wire cage – packed shoulder to shoulder with others of your own kind.
You are so crowded that you cannot walk or even fully extend your limbs. Imagine living side by side with the rotting bodies of your cage mates and suffering for weeks on end with untreated wounds and infections.
For over 250 million hens in the United States this is their daily reality.
A new Mercy For Animals undercover investigation is throwing back the curtains on one of California’s largest factory egg farms - exposing the routine abuse that takes place behind the closed doors of our nation’s egg industry.
From August – September, an MFA investigator worked at Norco Ranch in Menifee, CA, documenting standard egg industry animal abuse, including:
Birds confined in tiny wire cages so small they couldn’t walk, perch, fully stretch their wings, or engage in other basic behaviors
Ill birds neglected to die on top of dead piles – denied veterinary care or proper attention
Workers killing birds by grabbing their necks and swinging them around in circles – an attempt to break their necks which often resulted in prolonged deaths for the animals
Hens suffering from bloody open wounds and untreated infections
Dead hens left to decompose in cages with birds still laying eggs for human consumption
Birds trapped in the wire of their cages or under the feeding trays without access to food or water
MFA's newest investigation illustrates once again that animal cruelty and neglect are the egg industry standard.
Such investigative footage is further evidence that battery cages are inherently cruel and should be banned. This November Californians will have a chance to do just that by voting yes on proposition 2 – a modest proposal that would grant farmed animals in the state the ability to stand up, turn around, lie down, and extend their limbs.
As consumers we can choose to support kindness over cruelty at each meal. Adopting a compassionate vegan diet is one of the best actions we can take to prevent needless animal suffering and end the conditions documented during this investigation.
Investigator's Dairy
Thursday, 8/21/08
I saw two hens with prolapsed uteruses, both bloody and fully protruded, with feces and a pink fluid covering the rear feathers and down.
Friday, 8/22/08
In every barn I saw birds with feces-encrusted hind ends, and when I observed them closely, I saw they had raw hind ends and swollen flesh around their cavities.
I saw that one of the piles of dead birds had a live hen lying in it. She was lying on her side and would move only her neck and head.
I noticed that some cages contained five to six birds.
About 20% of the hens had mangled beaks, likely the result of careless de-beaking. Some of their bottom beaks were twice the length of their top beaks, making it difficult for them to pick up food.
Saturday, 8/23/08
I found two hens with atrophied crests who were lethargic and thin. One of them had her head lodged under her front cage wall.
Sunday, 8/24/08
Several dead hens were piled onto a cart and I saw that one hen was still shallowly breathing. Her head was hanging down and she was gasping for breath with her eyes closed, a clear fluid occasionally dripping from her mouth. I pointed this out to a worker and asked if it was a problem. He said “No. Pretty soon it’s dead.” He then grabbed her by her head, picked her up and spun her in circles a few times before dropping her back onto the dead pile. For about 90 seconds the hen lay there twitching.
I saw three hens with pus-filled, scabbing abscesses on their faces today.
I found a hen in a top cage with a large prolapse dripping blood. There was one other hen in her cage who had a bloody beak, indicating that this bird had been cannibalizing the prolapse.
Monday, 8/25/08
I saw four more hens with prolapses today. One was bleeding so heavily that it was a blood-soaked pile of feces on the egg belt that drew my attention to it. I also saw four bloodstained hens inside the cage.
Wednesday, 8/27/08
I found four hens with atrophied crests who were very lethargic. I placed three of them on top of cages, where one sat and two lay down, all of them motionless. Only one responded to my petting her, at which point she briefly raised and then lowered her head.
Thursday, 8/28/08
I saw a lethargic hen in a cage with a hardened hind end, swollen to twice the size of a normal chicken’s. What few feathers remained on the swollen area were coated in feces.
I saw two live hens lying on the floor. One was holding her head up, while the other rested her head on the ground. Neither could walk or flap her wings. I picked one up, who kicked lightly once and then let her head droop as she shut her eyes. The other bird let me pet her, kicking softly when I initially touched her but then lying motionless.
Friday, 8/29/08
In all of the barns I saw many birds with neuromas, painful tumors of the nerves, on their upper and lower beaks, some up to ¾ of an inch in diameter and covered in scabs.
The floor of one of the barns was cleaned while I was working in it, revealing maggots crawling over the floor of the barn.
Saturday, 8/30/08
I noticed about 40 dead chickens piled up inside and outside of barn bay doors and collected into a dozer blade this morning.
I also found a hen with a massive prolapse, covered in fresh blood. The hen walked low to the wire flooring and was being trampled by other birds in her cage.
Sunday, 8/31/08
I saw that one bird, lying underneath several other hens piled onto a metal cart, was still alive. It was clear that she was alive and breathing, with her head rising and falling as it hung toward the floor.
In one of the barns I saw a hen with her right leg bent back backwards about 45 degrees.
Monday, 9/1/08
I saw an egg with fresh blood on it in the egg collection belt. I then saw that one hen in a cage of four had openly bleeding tears on the outside of her cavity.
I also found a heavily decomposed hen in a top cage with three live hens. Her body was trampled flat with organs dangling through the wire flooring.
Thursday, 9/4/08
There were about 45 dead chickens in barns today. Two of the dead hens were in a cage together with two live hens.
Friday, 9/5/08
This morning I saw a live hen lying immobile on the floor next to two dead hens. Later there were two more dead hens in the pile, and the live hen was in death throes, twitching and slightly convulsing.
While working on egg collection belts, I saw tiny insects covering the eggs and egg belts. When I pulled my hands away from the belts, there were dozens of insects on my hands and arms.
Saturday, 9/6/08
I saw a dead hen in a bottom cage with blood covering the floor below her. I saw that her organs were spilling out of her cavity, with fresh blood dripping from them.
Sunday, 9/7/08
I saw about five dead hens in cages throughout the day, two whose heads were lodged under their cages’ front walls and others who had fallen from their cages onto the egg belts.
I found a live hen with her body trapped under her cage’s front wall and draped over the egg belt with eggs backing up against her head. I picked up the hen and took her to a worker, saying, “She’s not dead.” The worker immediately grabbed the hen by the head and spun her in circles for several seconds before throwing her on the concrete floor, where she gasped, twitched her legs, and convulsed for nearly two minutes.
Monday, 9/8/08
I found a hen with her head and right wing under her cage’s front wall. Clear fluid was dripping from her beak tip onto the egg belt below her creating a pool of drool.
Wednesday, 9/10/08
I saw a hen with an entire side of her face swollen about half an inch out. Her left eye was almost swollen shut.
Thursday, 9/11/08
I saw another bird with an entire side of her face swollen about an inch out. The swelling pushed her skin out to the point where her left eye was only a slit.
Sunday, 9/14/08
There was a pool of blood about eight inches in diameter in a pile of feces below one of the cages. I also saw a hen whose rear abdomen was swollen and her cavity was covered in pus.
I found two crippled hens today. I took one out of her cage and saw that she was unable to fly, walk, or move at all, other than to kick one leg weakly. Her head and part of her right wing were under the front wall of her cage with eggs bumping against her head.
I found another crippled hen partially under the front wall of her cage. Her left leg was stretched out and partially on an egg belt, and her neck was bent around backwards and to the left so her beak was touching her abdomen.
Monday, 9/15/08
This morning I saw that one of the barns was empty of birds and about 10 kill carts and 45 carbon dioxide containers were in the room. One kill cart was about ¾ full of dead hens, who had died inhaling the acidic, pungent CO2 gas. A worker told me that the birds were killed after about 1 year and 8 months in cages.
Another worker told me that he had found a live hen in a cage he was cleaning. I told another worker about this hen and she explained that it was likely that the bird’s leg was caught in the cage wire and no one bothered to dislodge her. I asked her what we should do with the bird, and she said to leave her there until she died.
Sunday, 9/21/08
I found several injured and sick birds throughout the ranch. I discovered four hens that appeared lethargic, lying in cages motionless. One of the hens was being trampled by two other birds in her cage who were stepping on her body and head.
I found a hen with a hard, swollen abdomen. Her rear end was about twice the size of a normal hen’s, missing nearly all of its feathers, and covered in excrement.
I saw that one dead hen’s head was lying on the egg belt running below her cage.
Expert Opinions
Independent experts in bird welfare and veterinary medicine reviewed the video footage from MFA's undercover investigation of Norco Ranch. Below are some of their statements:
Nedim C. Buyukmihci, V.M.D.
Dr. Buyuckmihci is an Emeritus Professor of Veterinary Medicine at the University of California, Davis. He has over 34 years of experience, much of it involving farmed animals including chickens. Dr. Buyuckmihci states:
"The video I viewed depicted typical, although inappropriate, practices at battery facilities. Hens were crowded in wire cages so that the birds could not lie down or walk, spread their wings or rest without causing major disturbance to the rest of the birds in the cage. This demonstrated that cage size was insufficient for normal postural adjustments. The cages had wire floors, something that is known to cause injury to the hens' feet. Because there were tiers of cages, hens below each row of cages would be subjected to waste material from the hens above, something that is unhygienic. Some of the hens had badly damaged feathers, probably a consequence of the extreme crowding and lack of opportunity to properly maintain their plumage. Many of the hens had what appeared to be serious injuries or other abnormalities to their vent areas. In some cases, this appeared to be due to tearing of the tissue or possibly cloacal rupture or prolapse. Some of the chickens may have been egg-bound. All these are painful conditions that would cause pain and suffering. Immediate veterinary intervention or euthanasia is necessary in order to minimize this. Because some of the conditions appeared to be relatively long-standing, it suggested that this was not being done. Some of the hens had various swellings involving the head. From the video footage, the cause or welfare implications could not be determined in most cases. In at least one, however, the lesion involved the right eye or orbital region. This appeared to be consistent with substantial inflammation and was likely painful, warranting immediate treatment or euthanasia. All the hens appeared to have been subjected to “de-beaking” or “beak trimming,” which is done in an attempt to reduce injury caused by the hens picking at each other. The reason for the aggression, however, is largely due to the crowded conditions. The consequence for the hens in the video, typical for this type of mutilation, is that the beaks were malformed. This would make prehension of food very difficult. Preening, an important behavioral and health related activity, would be essentially impossible. In addition, because the beak is rich in nerves, the cutting of this tissue can result in neuromas. The latter are painful tumors caused by aberrant regrowth of the nervous tissue. This was evident in several of the birds in the video and probably was a source of constant discomfort. There were several scenes in which a worker apparently attempted to kill chickens by twirling the body while holding onto the head. This is not a veterinary approved method of killing birds. Nor is such treatment likely to kill quickly in all cases and would cause considerable pain and suffering in the interim even if the bird eventually succumbed. The video footage showed several live birds, some conscious, on piles of what appeared to be dead birds. If the method of “killing” that I observed was routine, then seeing these living birds would not be surprising. Although it cannot be proven from the video footage, it is likely that many of these living birds were in pain. Some birds were trapped by the cage structures so that they could not move. In addition to the stress and suffering caused by this type of restraint, these individuals would also not be able to get food or water. This would add to their suffering. Such situations demand immediate intervention. A few crippled hens were shown lying outside the cages. These hens did not appear to have had access to water or food. If they were being left there for more than a few hours, this would result in further suffering for them. Euthanasia or removal to a location where they could get proper care would mitigate the negative welfare of the situation. Many dead birds were shown in the cages. Some of these clearly had died days to weeks before, as evidenced by the state of decomposition or mummification of the bodies. There was no way to determine from the video if the hens had died quickly or had experienced a slow and possibly painful death. It is feasible that some may have died of contagious conditions or have developed contagious opportunistic infestations during decomposition that could then have placed the other hens at risk. It is axiomatic that dead animals should be immediately removed from contact with living animals particularly under intense housing conditions such as battery cages in order to reduce the chance of contagion. There is no question that the manner in which the chickens depicted in the video were treated was cruel by any normal definition of the word and resulted in suffering for the birds. The treatment of the hens violated norms of conduct with respect to animal welfare and veterinary care. None of this was necessary in order to pursue the purpose of the facility, which appeared to be the production of eggs. As such, it seems to me that this would constitute a violation of applicable animal cruelty laws."
Sara Shields, Ph.D.
Dr. Shields is an animal welfare scientist at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, where she teaches in the Animal Science department. Dr. Shields earned her Ph.D. at the University of California, Davis, in the Animal Behavior program. There she worked with both broiler chickens and laying hens. She also worked in the Emergency Disease Program at the California Department of Food and Agriculture. Dr. Shields states:
"It is clear that a few of the birds left in the piles of dead hens are still alive; some show slight body movements and shallow breathing, while others appear to be completely alert. Without access to feed, water, and veterinary attention, these birds are likely to suffer immensely while they slowly die."
"In addition to the hens with prolapsed oviducts, many of the hens in the video show signs of other medical conditions that would require immediate attention, veterinary diagnosis, and individualized care. Others have experienced poor beak trimming treatments, leaving them with permanent beak abnormalities."
"In addition to the injuries, ailments, and obvious suffering depicted, there is also a vast body of scientific knowledge providing ample evidence that battery cages, such as those in the video, are simply inappropriate environments for laying hens in the first place. Battery cages restrict natural hen behavior to such a degree that their ethological needs are frustrated, which may lead to distress and further suffering."
"Such conditions are deplorable and reform is desperately needed throughout the egg industry."
Christi Camblor, DVM
Dr. Camblor received her Bachelors of Science in Animal Biology and her doctorate in veterinary medicine at the University of California, Davis. Dr. Camblor states:
Several labeled clips were provided for my revision; Killing, Live Hens on Dead Piles, Sick/ Injured Hens, Trapped, Crowding and Death. Below I’ve listed a summary of the conditions observed in each of the corresponding segments. Killing In this segment an unidentified worker is seen wringing the necks of hens and tossing them aside onto the floor, where several other carcasses have already been tossed aside. There are several examples shown wherein following the neck wringing the birds are clearly still alive, yet they are thrown aside with the other dead hens. This footage illustrates that the technique used at this facility is not consistently effective and is not a reliable, humane method of ensuring death in these birds. The animals tossed aside while still alive have assuredly endured painful, severe injuries as a result of the crude and imprecise method employed and, furthermore, are then left to linger and die slowly on their own. Live Hens on Dead Piles This portion shows multiple examples of live hens being found within heaps of dead carcasses. The majority of these hens appear to be in dire condition, visibly crippled animals can be seen, birds that appear to be demonstrating agonal breathing, birds so physically deteriorated they are barely able to lift their heads. Without question, leaving a live animal to die of its own recourses while surrounded in a mound of dead carcasses is an inhumane, unacceptable practice. The fact that these birds also clearly are suffering from physical injury adds to the cruelty demonstrated by this practice. Sick/Injured Hens This section of the film shows a variety examples of severely injured animals on the production line. Birds are shown with prolapsed cloacas, facial and ocular abscesses, broken limbs, and ulcerated, bloody genitivally. All of these conditions are painful, chronic health conditions that left untreated lead to prolonged suffering and ill health. They also pose serious threats to the sanitation of the product {in this case the egg} given the animals are often covered in blood, feces, and purulent material as a result of some of these injuries and are then left amidst the other birds. Allowing these birds to endure these atrocious physical ailments without the benefit of medical attention or immediate euthanasia seriously infringes upon their welfare and constitutes abhorrent animal cruelty in my opinion. Trapped Birds in this portion of the film can be seen with various body parts trapped within the wire confines of their cages. Most often heads and necks are trapped, but there are also clips wherein the birds have their limbs trapped as well, along with entire torsos. These animals are left on the assembly line and can be seen being repeatedly bombarded with eggs as they pass along the trough their heads and limbs are caught in. There is no evidence that there is any sort of recourse for these birds, who invariably must suffer broken limbs, appendages, and painful, repetitive injuries as a result of having gotten a part of themselves trapped within the battery cages. Crowding This section shows what appears to be typical, industry standard battery cage crowding wherein birds are literally so crowded they are unable to stand, and as such must flop and crawl atop one another. The intense crowding demonstrated on this portion of the film clearly impinges upon the welfare of these animals who are unable to perform even the most basic of acts, such as simply standing up, turning around, or stretching their wings. Death Numerous examples of dead animals are shown in cages of live hens. These conditions are unsanitary and inhumane, as they demonstrate not only a level of care so poor animals are dying on their own before pulling culled, but then are also left to rot amongst live animals who are trapped within the confines of the same battery cage. In closing, the overall conditions demonstrated within the video footage made available show clear animal cruelty, undeniable inhumane treatment of the birds and egregious animal suffering.
Kate Hurley, DVM, MPVM
Dr. Hurley received her Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree Master’s degree in Preventive Veterinary Medicine from University of California, Davis. Dr. Hurley states:
"The images shown in the Mercy For Animals video of Norco ranch powerfully underscore the urgent need for Proposition 2, an initiative on the November ballot that would prevent the worst abuses associated with factory farming."
"The practices and conditions depicted in the Norco video do not reasonably fall anywhere within the bounds of acceptable herd health care."
"Battery cage systems can not provide humane conditions under the best of circumstances: suffering is inevitable when hens are so restricted that they can not take even a few steps or stretch their wings without running into wire cage walls or another bird. The Norco video starkly demonstrates that the suffering, injuries, disease and death associated with battery cage systems extend far beyond restriction of movement and prevention of normal behaviors."
Egg producers remove a portion of hens’ beaks with machinery, and without painkillers, to reduce the feather pecking that can occur in birds confined with no outlet for their normal foraging, dustbathing, and exploratory activities. Debeaked birds suffer acute and chronic pain in their beaks, heads and faces, because the nerves of the beak are connected to the nerves in the face and the brain which start to develop when the embryo is two days old. Debeaked birds cannot grasp their food efficiently, and they have trouble preening themselves and grooming the faces of their flock mates, which can cause them to appear to be “aggressive,” when all they are trying to do is remove bits of debris that a normal beak grasps easily.
Rough handling, yelling and being grabbed by the head, neck, tail or wing, as operators shove the birds’ faces up against and into the debeaking machinery, then pull the birds violently away and toss them into containers, causes broken bones, torn and twisted beaks and injuries to their delicate joints.
Photo by: East Bay Animal Advocates "Free-range organic" young turkeys at Diestel Turkey Ranch with surgically mutilated beaks that will drop off leaving severely shortened upper beaks.
Background
In the 1920s, farmers began raising chickens indoors on wire floors. Crowded together with no opportunity to scratch, dustbathe, and explore, the birds started picking at each other. Instead of rectifying the environment, farmers chose beak mutilation. In the 1930s and ‘40s, a San Diego, California farmer named T.E. Wolfe used a gas torch to burn off part of the upper beaks of his hens. Later his neighbor adapted a soldering iron by giving it a chisel edge that enabled operators to apply downward pressure on the bird’s upper beak to sear and cauterize it. In 1942-1943, the San Diego company Lyon Electric developed and registered the first “Debeaker” machine. The company is still in business.
Chickens raised for meat are no longer debeaked because “meat-type” chickens are slaughtered as six-week old babies, before they are old enough to form a social order. By contrast, hens used to produce eggs for human consumption and roosters used for breeding in the egg and meat industries are debeaked between the ages of one-day-old and five months old. Likewise, turkeys, pheasants, quails, and guinea fowl are debeaked and ducks are debilled. So-called “free-range” and “cage-free” chickens and turkeys are usually debeaked at the hatchery as well.
Poultry producers used to deceive the public that a beak was as insensitive as the tip of a fingernail, but this assertion can no longer be made because decades of research have refuted it. Debeaking was fully explored by the Brambell Committee, a group of veterinarians and other experts appointed by the British Parliament to investigate welfare concerns arising from Ruth Harrison’s expose of factory farming – Harrison coined the term “factory farming” – in her book Animal Machines, published in 1964. In 1965, the Brambell Committee said “beak-trimming should be stopped immediately in caged birds and within two years for non-caged birds.”
The Committee explained: “The upper mandible of the bird consists of a thin layer of horn covering a bony structure of the same profile which extends to within a millimeter or so of the tip of the beak. Between the horn and bone [of the beak] is a thin layer of highly sensitive soft tissue, resembling the quick of the human nail. The hot knife blade used in debeaking cuts through this complex of horn, bone and sensitive tissue causing severe pain.”
Acute and Chronic Pain
In 1993, Ian Duncan, a poultry researcher at the University of Guelph in Ontario, said “there is now good morphological, neurophysiological, and behavioral evidence that beak trimming leads to both acute and chronic pain,” including phantom limb pain. Poultry producers use the term “beak tenderness” to describe conditions that prompt advice about the need for deep feed troughs to prevent the wounded beak from bumping the bottom of the trough resulting in starve-outs. Machine operators are reminded to do the “very tedious task” of beak trimming carefully, because “too often it is done carelessly” causing eyes to be “seared” and “blisters in the mouth.”
“Further Research”
Debeaking experiments are a worldwide enterprise. The 2005 book, Beak Trimming, edited by Philip C. Glatz, contains 27 pages of published experiments covering 40 years. (Countless other experiments have never been published.) Despite the “wealth of scientific information on the welfare of beak-trimmed birds, beak-trimming methods and alternatives to beak-trimming,” according to Beak Trimming, “there is a lack of comprehensive studies that measure the effect of beak-trimming on welfare using multiple indicators (physiological as well as behavioural) and it is hard to compare between studies due to different methods of beak-trimming and beak-trimming at different ages” (Glatz, p. 77). More research is “needed.” Etc. Etc.
Debeaking methods include the use of hot blades, cold blades, soldering irons, jackknives, pruning shears, dog nail clippers, liquid nitrogen used to “declaw emus,” machines consisting of “a hot plate and cutting bar operated by means of a foot lever,” robotic beak trimmers where chicks are loaded onto the robot by hand, with “holding cups around their heads,” chemical debeaking using capsaicin, “a cheap non toxic substance extracted from hot peppers that causes depletion of certain neuropeptides from sensory nerves in birds,” infrared beak treatment machines that cause the affected part of the beak to soften and “erode away,” and laser machines that cut the beak tissue with “intense emissions of light” and heat absorption.
The suffering of the birds subjected to these torturous surgeries is played down by many (not all) of the experimenters. For example, in one experiment, newborn chicks whose beaks were cut with an ophthalmic laser were said to “vocalize” in response to an increase in “energy density” indicating they were feeling “discomfort” when the laser failed to cut the inner bone of their beaks, seemingly “due to the lack of [electrical] power” (Glatz, p. 9).
A machine called a Bio-Beaker, developed in Millsboro, Delaware in the 1980s, uses a high voltage electrical current to burn a hole in the upper beak that’s supposed to cause it to fall off in about a week. The birds “struggle” as their beaks are shoved into the instrument and “struggle” again when the electricity is administered, and they often have to be debeaked a second time to correct a botched job and because young birds’ beaks can grow back. Used on turkeys, the Bio-Beaker is said to be “more successful” than with chickens, although “operator errors and inconsistencies have caused welfare problems for turkeys” . Perhaps the Bio-Beaker (or the laser machine) is responsible for the blackened, necrotic, crumbling beaks of baby turkeys photographed by investigators in recent visits to U.S. turkey farms.
For example, East Bay Animal Advocates (www.eastbayanimaladvocates.org) recently found horrible conditions at Diestel Turkey Ranch, a so-called “free range/organic” turkey farm in California and a supplier to Whole Foods Market, which claims to have “Animal Compassionate Standards.” The photo on page two shows young turkeys at Diestel with blackened necrotic beaks. Despite the exposure of Diestel, Whole Foods continues doing business with them.
In 1990 Michael Gentle and his associates at the Institute of Animal Physiology and Genetics Research, Edinburgh, Scotland, showed that experimentally debeaked chickens demonstrated chronic pain and suffering following the operation. Gentle explains: "The avian beak is a complex sensory organ which not only serves to grasp and manipulate food particles prior to ingestion, but is also used to manipulate non-food articles in nesting behavior and exploration, drinking, preening, and as a weapon in defensive and aggressive encounters. To enable the animal to perform this wide range of activities, the beak of the chicken has an extensive nerve supply with numerous mechanoreceptors, thermoreceptors, and nociceptors [ nerve endings sensitive to mechanical pressures, heat and pain]....Beak amputation results in extensive neuromas [tumors] being formed in the healed stump of the beak which give rise to abnormal spontaneous neural activity in the trigeminal [threefold] nerve. The nociceptors present in the beak of the chicken have similar properties to those found in mammalian skin and the neural activity arising from the trigeminal neuromas is similar to that reported in the rat, mouse, cat and the baboon. Therefore, in terms of the peripheral neural activity, partial beak amputation is likely to be a painful procedure leading not only to phantom and stump pain, but also to other characteristics of the hyperpathic syndrome, such as allodynia and hyperalgesia [the stress resulting from, and extreme sensitiveness to, painful stimuli]."
Gentle and associates compared 5 behaviors in 16 experimentally debeaked Leghorn hens with the same behaviors in a control (nondebeaked) group of hens: number of bill wipes, head shakes, drinking movements, pecks directed to water and floor, and pecks directed to cage sides. In their experiment, "Partial beak amputation produced a number of significant alterations to the behavior of the birds. The birds pecked less at the environment after amputation than before and this difference can be interpreted as guarding behavior of a painful area of the body, similar to that seen in man and other animals....Guarding behavior can also be used to explain the reduction in head shaking and beak wiping following amputation. Head shaking is a behavior commonly associated with feeding and drinking and, like beak wiping, it functions to remove food particles or irritant substances from the mouth or surface of the beak....The modifications in the pecking and drinking behavior of birds following partial beak amputation [conforms with other reports] that partial beak amputation results in long-term (56 weeks) increases in dozing and general inactivity, behaviors associated with long-term chronic pain and depression."
