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Problems & Solutions
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 Debeaking |
Debeaking (or beak trimming), a euphemism for searing off the nerve-rich tips of a bird’s beak with a hot blade—done to prevent attacks due to overcrowding— is allowed in free-range and organic operations.
In addition to debeaking, animals are subject to painful mutilations and amputations without painkillers. These include toe cutting, tail-docking (cutting off part of the tail), ear-notching, de-horning, teeth pulling, castration (having their testicles ripped out of their scrotums), and branding (being burned with hot irons). These procedures are done to lessen the impact of aggressive behaviors due to overcrowding and for identification purposes.
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Castration Even in the best cage-free operations, laying hens (hens raised for eggs) are slaughtered after about two years, when their productivity declines. These hens are killed in the same manner as other “spent” laying hens.
When workers at two California farms decided it was time to slaughter their laying hens, they threw 30,000 live hens into wood chippers. The perpetrators in this case were not charged with animal cruelty. While this heinous act was not committed at a cage free or organic farm, such killing methods of spent hens are not illegal at such operations.
Another problem in both conventional and organic egg operations is surplus male chicks. Because there is no market for these babies hatched as a byproduct of the egg industry, 250 million male chicks are "disposed" of each year (apx. 650,000/hour). They are not raised for meat because they have not been genetically selected to grow very quickly like "broiler" chickens.
Common methods used to kill 250,000,000 unwanted male chicks:
- maceration, using a large high-speed grinder into which live chicks are fed
- gases or gas mixtures, often carbon dioxide is used to induce unconsciousness and then death
- cervical dislocation, manually induced dislocation of the spinal column from the skull
- suffocation (chicks are thrown way in trash cans, buried alive under each other)
Access to outdoors is NOT actual time outdoors
The USDA requires that free-range birds must have “access to the outdoors.” However, the size and quality of the outdoor area and the amount of time the birds are allowed outside is not regulated. So, in practice, this means that thousands of birds can be confined to a shed with an opening leading to a small yard, for a restricted amount of time each day.
For example, a study of about 800,000 chickens kept on free-range farms in the United Kingdom found that even though U.K. regulations require birds to have access to outdoor areas for at least 8 hours a day, “the maximum number observed outside during daylight hours at any one time was less than 15% of the total flock.” The study explained, “Chickens prefer ranging areas with trees [and] they avoid bright sun” and that “[a] wide open field is simply not a preferred habitat.” The researchers explained that domesticated chickens, much like their wild ancestors, need a habitat that provides shelter from wind, sun, and predators and that free-range operations should provide birds with more protection if they want to entice them to roam outside the barns. (1)
The Associated Press reported that the USDA’s regulations don’t “require the birds to actually spend time outdoors, only to have access.” (2) An eyewitness revealed that on a farm advertising that its hens were raised in a “natural setting,” the birds were actually crammed “wall to wall—6,800 chickens with one rooster for every hundred hens. They never step foot outside.” (3)
Transport long distances in all weather extremes
Excerpted from Vegan Outreach
Free-range and organic animals are not typically accorded any special treatment when transported to the slaughterhouse. Cows and pigs stand tightly crammed together in their own excrement, while exposed to extreme weather in open trucks, sometimes freezing to the trailer. (1) These conditions can result in “downers”—animals too sick or weak to walk, even when shocked with electric prods or beaten. Downers are dragged by chains to slaughter or to “dead piles” where they are left to die. (2)
 Turkeys during transport(photo courtesy of Vegan Outreach) |
Things have gotten worse; research presented at the 2006 Meat Industry Conference shows: "The number of pigs dying on the way to the slaughterhouse has nearly tripled in recent years."
Animals may be fully conscious during the slaughter
Excerpted from Vegan Outreach
Animals are abused and manhandled, and many are not first rendered unconscious during typical slaughter processes. If fact, Kosher or Halal slaughter require that animals are fully conscious when their carotid arteries are cut. This is supposed to cause unconsciousness within seconds, but because of blood flow through the vertebral arteries in the back of the neck, some animals can remain conscious as they bleed for up to a minute.
Click here for more details about transport and slaughter.
Solutions - Free Veg Starter Kit with Recipes
Less is More: The Most Humane Choice
Excerpted from HumaneMyth.com
It is admirable and important to investigate the impact our actions have on others, and when we find that there is a change we can make that will do less harm to others, it is right to pursue it. However, it is equally important to be realistic and well informed, and not to take actions in the name of compassion that soothe our conscience while not necessarily addressing the violence and injustice being experienced by others.
The animal-using industry has a decades-long track record of misleading the public, on everything from the health benefits of consuming their products to the living conditions and mode of death of the animals who are killed to create those products. The statements of former farmers, animal rescuers, humane police officers and investigators raise troubling questions to this effect. Positive-sounding labels are guaranteed to increase sales of more expensive "humane" products, but the evidence suggests that this is where the guarantees end.
The association of an animal organization with a given labeling scheme doesn't change this reality. Just think about it. Presently, over 50 BILLION animals are killed annually worldwide. Is it even remotely plausible that an orderly, trustworthy, and reliable system will ever be devised to insure a given standard of treatment for any but a miniscule fraction of those individuals, most of which are "worth" just a few dollars?
What the animal-using industry does not want the public to know is that the creation of all animal products unavoidably involves injustice. (To get a better idea of how true this really is, view as examples the Behind the Myth slide shows about "Happy Cows" and "Cage Free Eggs.")
So, even if the claims being made about how a given animal was treated were credible and completely trustworthy, would they actually address the basic moral problem that arises when animals' lives are taken against their will in order to satisfy our palate? ...
In fact, the only way you can truly be sure that your dietary choices are not harming animals is to stop eating animal products. Each time you make the decision to use or consume a non-animal alternative, you can be confident you are making a real difference, that you are no longer contributing to a grievous injustice done to animals on farms as well as wildlife--animal agriculture is the number one cause of habitat destruction worldwide. And since healthy, tasty, environmentally-friendly vegan alternatives exist, why not do what is good for your health, good for the animals and good for our planet?
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Every day, at every meal, we use our dollars to vote.
Good News... going veg is easier than ever because of the increasing varieties of meat and dairy substitutes. There are easy-to-heat frozen foods for those who don't cook, as well as fantastic recipes for all levels.
Even though meat-alternatives and dairy-alternatives can help to ease the transition to healthy, compassionate meat-free living, they are not necessary. As long as you eat a variety of healthy foods (which everyone should do whether or not they eat meat), a fully plant-based diet can meet your nutritional needs.
Find out more by ordering a FREE Veg Starter Kit. We also have additional materials in the resources section. Learn the reality of slaughter and how animals are killed for food by watching PETA’s video, Meet Your Meat.
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