Cruel Practices in Farm Animal Husbandry
Modern farming systems are causing severe animal cruelty
Modern farming systems are compromising animals鈥 health status and immunity through practices like overstocking, which lead to consequently given transmission pathways. They are providing ideal conditions for pathogens to spread and mutate, which can lead to disease outbreaks with zoonotic potential and further evolve to a future pandemic.鈥
Moreover, most animals experience negative states of welfare throughout their lives and cannot fulfil their basic needs. Young animals are usually separated from their mothers at a very young age. Then, they are reared artificially and kept individually, when they should be kept socially as it is otherwise highly detrimental to their health, , .
Animals receive only the bare essential veterinary care and are commonly subjected to cruel and painful mutilations, such as dehorning or castration, without any pain relief. They are fed with high-concentrate feed opposed to a species-appropriate quality diet which would only be essential for maintaining their physical health, but also gives them the possibility to express their natural behaviour. In addition, they do not have access to an outdoor area or pasture and instead are kept in tight cages or stalls, which are lacking in basic amenities 鈥 such as clean and soft lying space, crucial for digestion and claw health, as well as for facilitating natural demeanour such as comfort behaviour. The animals, which are kept outside 鈥 for example, cattle in feedlots, are in an even worse position, as they face muddy conditions and heat stress that come with the lack of an actual shelter.鈥
Once the animals reach a certain stage in production, they are transported for hours, days, or even weeks 鈥 either by land or sea, and then slaughtered 鈥 not necessarily with prior stunning of the animal. Both the transport and the whole slaughtering process are escorted by pain, suffering and distress (sick and stranded animals on vessels, slaughterhouse scandals, slaughtering without stunning, etc.).
These cruel practices are common to all farm animals, with slight differentiations amongst species.
Chickens
- Mutilations
- Killings of male chicks
- Stocking density in the stalls
- Breeding for extreme performance
- Laying hens in cages
- Live Animal Transport
Goats
- Mutilations
- Separation of kids from their mothers (dairy goats)
- Bad handling during shearing and combing in wool goats
- Slaughter (developing countries)
- Live Animal Transport
Sheep
- Mutilations
- Separation of lambs from their mothers (dairy sheep)
- Mulesing
- Bad handling during shearing
- Slaughter (developing countries)
- Live Animal Transport
Cattle
- Mutilations
- Concentrate feeding
- Young animals kept in isolation
- Tethering of the animals
- Breeding for extreme performance
- Fully slatted flooring
- Separation of calf and mother
- Live Animal Transport
Pigs
- Highly intensive concentrate feeding
- Keeping sows in crates
- Breeding for extreme performance
- Fully slatted flooring
- Live Animal Transport
- Mutilation procedures
Waterfowl
- No water access
- Force-feeding (foie gras)
- Stocking density in the stalls
- Live feather plucking
- Cage systems
- Keeping of (solitary) Muscovy ducks
- Live Animal Transport
- Mutilations
Rabbits
- Breeding angora rabbits with excessive hair
- Cruel handling of rabbits
- Wire mesh flooring
- Cage systems for rabbits
- Live Animal transport
Source
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3. De Paula Vieira A, von Keyserlingk MAG, Weary DM. Effects of pair versus single housing on performance and behavior of dairy calves before and after weaning from milk. Journal of Dairy Science. 2010;93(7):3079鈥3085. doi:10.3168/jds.2009-2516
4. Suntinger M, Kofler J, Pesenhofer R, Winckler C, Egger-Danner C. Measures to monitor and improve claw health, lameness and animal welfare in Austrian dairy farms. 2019;(24).
5. Grandin T. Evaluation of the welfare of cattle housed in outdoor feedlot pens. Veterinary and Animal Science. 2016;1鈥2:23鈥28. doi:10.1016/j.vas.2016.11.001