Essay on Management and Maintenance of Commercial Piggeries

Birds’ wings may be clipped so that they cannot fly, aquatic animals often go without adequate water, and many animals who naturally live in large herds or family groups are kept alone or, at most, in pairs. Natural hunting and mating behaviors are virtually eliminated by regulating feeding and breeding regimens. Animals are closely confined, lack privacy, and have little opportunity for mental stimulation or physical exercise. These conditions often result in abnormal and self-destructive behavior, known as “zoochosis.” (PETA 8)

This is an argument that I could certainly see being made among many consumers. But before diving into the argument I believe it is first important to define the term factory farm that is most commonly used among animal rights activists in an antagonistic manner. But according to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, a factory farm is a large industrialized farm; especially: a farm on which large numbers of livestock are raised indoors in conditions intended to maximize production at minimal cost (Factory farm). But according to an article published by The American Farm Bureau Federation, 97 percent of farms are family-owned, not corporate factories (Farm Bureau). And while some animals are raised in confinement, there are strict laws and regulations in place that require a certain square footage of space per animal. These regulations permit enough space for the animals to move at free will while waste removal systems keep facilities clean. It is also important to remember that if an animal does not have adequate space, food and water availability, and a clean environment it will never be productive. While I realize that a “factory farm” may seem cruel, I refute the objection, as it is first important to remember that 97 percent of farms are family-owned and that those facilities where livestock are raised

Factory farms have abused these animals in way that is so horrific, it is not often revealed to the public what really goes on inside these “farms.” Animals such as chickens are shoved together into battery cages to the point where they are unable to move. Their beaks are cut off without anesthesia, and they are propelled with antibiotics and excessively fed for the purpose of making their breasts larger quickly. The excessive feeding makes their bodies grow unnaturally and disproportionally – causing heart failure, respiratory troubles, chronic pain, and leg weakness; after a hen’s egg production reduces at a certain age, the bird will be shocked into its final laying cycle and then be sent to slaughter to be used as food scraps – if they are not already killed on-farm. As for mother pigs, they spend up to four months in gestation crates with only limited mobility during their pregnancy. "Her piglets are

The poor housing of farm animals in factory farms is an issue because the stress factors and living conditions can cause the animals immune systems to weaken. According to an article about the practices of factory farming, “Common practices include packing pregnant pigs into gestation crates so small they cannot turn around, placing egg-laying hens in cages stacked on top of one another in massive enclosed buildings and raising cows on feedlots rather than the grass pastures many of us associate with ruminants” (Anomaly 1). This quote explains that the living space of animals in a factory farm is different from what consumers expect. When consumers go to the grocery store, they may see a picture of an old country farm with animals freely wondering, but in reality animals are stored as items and not free creatures. According to an article written by Bradley S. Miller, “As reported by a veterinarian, Dr. Bruce Feldman, When animals are intensively confined and under stress, as they are in factory farms, their auto-immune systems are weakened and they are prone to infectious diseases” (Miller 2). This quote speaks of how much the risk factors of sickness increase when animals are confined and under great amounts of stress. Overpopulated animal storage is an ethical and moral concern because it brings an unnecessary stress and a burden to animals. Not only is the storage of animals, both ethically and morally wrong, consequently, it is also a reason that disease outbreaks occur in many factory farms.

A short documentary film, ‘Zoochosis’, highlights odd behaviors captive animals can exhibit. These unnatural behaviors are repetitive, such as rocking, vomiting, head-bobbing, pacing, and other repetitive actions. Although the cause is still unknown, many experts believe one of the reasons for this disorder is extreme stress (Ramos). When animals are placed in enclosures with animals they aren’t compatible with, it can often lead to aggression and hostility. This is an unhealthy and stressful environment for the animals and, if stress is the cause of zoochosis, can lead to the unnatural behaviors.

The last reason is the sows would get sick less if they were in bigger confinements. Gestation crates cause disease to spread quicker than it normally would. Since they are crammed so close together bacteria build up quickly, it also also the bacterium to multiply and stay there since the pig can’t move. The bacteria build up on or under the pig. It is obvious we could decrease the death rate of sows and make them more comfortable at the same time if factory farming stops using gestation

Gestational crates should not be on factory farms. Gestational crates limit the pigs movement so much that the mothers are stuck on there sides when there are pregnant and can not move to eat or go to the bathroom. Gestational crates should not be on factory farming. In this essay I will talk about how gestational crates abuse the pigs that are put in them, how the mother pigs are treated on these farms and how free range farming is better for the animals. I think that gestational crates should not be on factory farms.

Not only is factory farming damaging human health but also the animals health. Chickens that lay eggs get their beaks cut off without anesthesia and stuffed into cages so small they can't flap their wings. Meat chickens are given antibiotics to grow quickly. Pregnant pigs and veal calves are kept in crates. We can prevent animals from getting abused by not eating meat or any factory farm products at every meal. Instead choose a healthier choice and eat vegetarian meals.

Riding is therefore more likely a way for a steer to exert dominance over another steer. The mounting behavior seen among feedlot buller steers is more likely to be related to social behavior, since in wild species of ungulates which are in the same taxonomic family as domestic beef cattle, submissive behavior is expressed by allowing the dominant animal to mount. One observational study by Klem et al. (1983) found that bullers were actually more aggressive than riders and the authors postulated that bullers may not be readily submitting to dominant riders. Social hierarchies between cattle appear to play a role in the generation of bullers in a feedlot setting. Dominant steers are naturally more aggressive than other steers in the pen, so they like to establish their dominance. Not surprisingly, when steers first arrive at a feedlot and are penned together, the number of bullers is at its highest. When animals are re-grouped, the number of bullers rises again as new pen members establish their social status. There is also evidence that suggests the expression of social dominance occurs more often in pens with large numbers of animals (Grognet, 2004; Brower and Kiracofe, 1978; Irwin et al.,

In farming conditions that I know of, due to growing up in a farming community, farmers see their animals and care for them as one would for a domestic pet. These farmers only lock their larger animals, like cows and pigs in a barn during cold nights and winters, otherwise letting them run freely in a large closed-in pasture, which is closed for their

Are factory farms actually telling the truth about how workers treat the animals?In 2011, at pig factory farms, there were much more than 5.8 million extremely small gestational crates used for mating in the United States of America. (Farm Sanctuary. N.p., n.d. 1)The community should stop purchasing Smithfield Farming products because of how the pigs are mistreated. People that buy from Smithfield are risking possibly getting food poison or sick.The average person needs to be made further aware of Smithfield’s acts.Smithfield Farms harm the animals, as a result, society should rethink buying Smithfield’s products.

. SRAP adds, “Because the animals are housed in such crowded and unsanitary conditions, CAFOs routinely mutilate them. For example, CAFOs cut off pigs’ tails to prevent these normally very social animals from biting them. CAFOs also de-beak chickens to reduce stress-induced pecking injuries, impairing their ability to eat. A quote by E.K. Silbergeld, a professor at the Johns Hopkins Center for Global Health, sums up the conditions inside a CAFO: “CAFOs are comparable to poorly run hospitals, where everyone gets antibiotics, patients lie in unchanged beds, hygiene is nonexistent, infections and re-infections are rife.” (“Factory Farms Abuse Animals.” Socially Responsible Agricultural Project. 16 feb. 2014. Web. 27 jan. 2016. http://www.sraproject.org/factory-farms-abuse-animals/)

The next time you buy the PrairieFresh brand of bacon or sausage at a Walmart store, you will be purchasing a product that was produced under the most inhumane conditions anyone could imagine. An article published in Mother Jones on February 1, 2012, details the ghastly cruelty that pigs are subjected to by two pork producers in Oklahoma. This paper reviews that article and the video that was produced by the United States Humane Society.

Pigs are unable to move in their cages. The baby pig ears, tails are cut off and their teeth are chopped off to prevent them from harming other pigs. They are castrated without any pain killer. The baby pigs are given antibiotics to promote rapid growth. Their body grows, so fast, the legs become crippled. Many pigs are ill, but are kept alive to be shipped off to slaughter to get a profit. The pigs that did not make it to slaughter are shot with a gun to prevent them from eating the farmer’s feed. Pigs are abused by beating them with a gate rod to be moved from one place to another. Most pigs arrive at the slaughter lame or dead from the crowdedness during transporting. Pigs are electrically shocked to move on the killing floor of the slaughtering

Mother pigs spend most of their miserable lives in tiny gestation and farrowing crates so small that they can’t even turn around and forced to get pregnant over and over again, until their bodies can’t handle it anymore.. Males are either killed immediately, or castrated at a young age then kept only for their meat. Piglets, in general, are torn away from their mothers after only a few weeks, tails are chopped off, and the ends of their teeth are snipped off, then the spend days to weeks to months in cramped, crowded pens on slabs of filthy concrete until it gets decided what will happen to them.