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Missouri’S Dirty Dozen: A Report On Some Of The Worst Puppy Mills In Missouri, The Humane Society Of The United States

PUPPY MILL INFORMATION

The purpose of the report is to demonstrate current problems that could be addressed by the passage of Proposition B, which Missouri citizens will vote on in November. Under Proposition B, the Puppy Mill Cruelty Prevention Act, many of these dealers’ horrific violations would be backed by stronger enforcement opportunities.

All of the puppy mills on the Dirty Dozen list are licensed by the USDA, the state, or both, according to the most recently available records reviewed by HSUS researchers. Some sell puppies to pet stores and others over the Internet. One thing they have in common is atrocious violations …

Health Professionals’ Roles In Animal Agriculture, Climate Change, And Human Health, Aysha Z. Akhtar, Michael Greger, Hope Ferdowsian, Erica Frank

Human Health Collection

What we eat is rapidly becoming an issue of global concern. With food shortages, the rise in chronic disease, and global warming, the impact of our dietary choices seems more relevant today than ever. Globally, a transition is taking place toward greater consumption of foods of animal origin, in lieu of plantbased diets. With this transition comes intensification of animal agriculture that in turn is associated with the emergence of zoonotic infectious diseases, environmental degradation, and the epidemics of chronic disease and obesity. Health professionals should be aware of these trends and consider them as they promote healthier and more …

Survey Of Dairy Management Practices On One Hundred Thirteen North Central And Northeastern United States Dairies, W. K. Fulwider, T. Grandin, B. E. Rollin, T. E. Engle, N. L. Dalstead, W. D. Lamm

Farm Animal Welfare Collection

The objective was to conduct a broad survey of dairy management practices that have an effect on animal well-being. Dairies were visited during the fall and winter of 2005 and 2006 in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Indiana, Iowa, and New York. Data were collected on 113 dairies on colostrum feeding, dehorning, tail-docking, euthanasia methods, producer statements about welfare, use of specialized calf-raising farms (custom), level of satisfaction with calf-raising by producers, and cow behavior. Calves were raised by the owner on 50.4% of dairies; 30.1% were raised on custom farms during the milk-feeding period, 18.6% were custom raised after weaning, and 1% …

Fish Behaviour And Welfare, Lynne U. Sneddon

Ethology Collection

Fish are farmed intensively in aquaculture which is an economic necessity to provide large quantities for the food industry yet many species’ normal behaviours may be impaired by the nature of intensive aquaculture. Recommendations have suggested that for optimum welfare, animals should be able to express their natural suite of behaviours. Confining large migratory species such as salmonids to relatively small tanks or cages means they are unable to perform the extensive migrations performed by their wild counterparts so are these fish frustrated? When considering why salmonids migrate, their motivation is to find food yet if they are well fed …

Farm Animal Welfare: In Legislatures, Corporate Boardrooms, And Private Kitchens, Andrea Gavinelli, Miyun Park

State of the Animals 2007

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, globally, approximately 56 billion land animals—including nearly 48 billion broiler chickens— are slaughtered for human consumption in a single year (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations 2004), in addition to an untold number of aquatic animals. The numbers of individual animals raised and killed by the meat, egg, and dairy industries far surpass the number of animals with whom human beings have any other relationship—whether they be those seen as fabric, target practice, test tubes, companions, or sideshow spectacles.

Animal Welfare Assurance Programs In Food Production: A Framework For Assessing The Options, D. Fraser

Farm Animal Welfare Collection

Various animal welfare assurance programs are being used to encourage or require the adoption of animal welfare standards in food production, and to assure the public that such standards are followed. The programs involve five main formats. Non-mandatory codes/guidelines are relatively easy to institute and appear well-supported by the industry, but provide only minimal assurance to the public unless measures are taken to ensure compliance. Programs based on government regulations and inter-governmental agreements are more challenging to institute; they are likely to generate less industry acceptance, but may provide more public confidence if enforcement is adequate. Product differentiation programs, and …

Horse Welfare Since 1950, Katherine A. Houpt, Natalie Waran

State of the Animals 2003

There are approximately 6.9 million horses in the United States, more than in any other country in the world (American Horse Council 2000) (Table 1). That fact alone should inspire Americans to improve equine welfare, although it must be said that the state of domesticated horses is better now than it was fifty years ago.

At the turn of the millennium, the most pressing welfare issues of the domestic horse surround conditions found in slaughter and transport to slaughter; pari-mutuel racing; the pregnant mare urine (PMU) industry; the competitive and show industry; and in the development of husbandry-related stereotypes. (Urban …

Farm Animals And Their Welfare In 2000, David Fraser, Joy Mench, Suzanne Millman

State of the Animals 2001

Farm animals have been a traditional concern of the modern animal protection movement. In the early 1800s, when the movement emerged as a significant sociopolitical force in the United Kingdom, its first priority was protection of farm animals, with particular emphasis on cattle and horses. Subsequently priorities changed, and throughout most of the 1900s, animal protectionism in Europe and the English-speaking world focused more strongly on the use of animals for scientific research and on the rescue of abandoned or ill-treated companion animals. Today, however, with vigorous public debate over animal agriculture and its effects, farm animals are re-emerging as …

Qualitative Assessment Of Animal Behaviour As An On-Farm Welfare-Monitoring Tool, Françoise Wemelsfelder, Alistair B. Lawrence

Sentience Collection

There is a growing need to monitor the health and welfare of farm animals, and to develop methods which do so efficiently and reliably. A crucial problem with current methods is the integration of separate measurements taken during farm visits into accurate judgements of an animal’s overall welfare state. This paper proposes that the qualitative assessment of animal behaviour may serve as an integrative methodology which could guide the interpretation of other, more detailed welfare measurements. Recent research has demonstrated qualitative behaviour assessment to be reliable and repeatable under controlled experimental conditions. The paper concludes with a discussion of ways …

Pain In Farm Animals, L. U. Sneddon, Michael J. Gentle

Farm Animal Welfare Collection

This review will address how we can measure pain in farm animals and discuss the major causes of acute pain and also chronically painful conditions, and finally make suggestions for future improvements. Pain is a relatively difficult concept to define since it comprises both a physiological sensory and a psychological or emotional component. Pain is the subjective interpretation of nerve impulses induced by a stimulus that is actually or potentially damaging to tissues. The sensation of pain is a response to a noxious stimulus and should elicit protective motor (e.g. withdrawal reflex, escape) and vegetative responses (e.g. cardiovascular responses, inflammation). …

Vocal Response To Pain In Piglets, Daniel M. Weary, Leah A. Braithwaite, David Fraser

Farm Animal Welfare Collection

Three experiments were performed attempting to establish the validity of vocal measures as an indicator of the immediate response to pain in domestic piglets. Vocalisations were measured while piglets were subjected to the routine farm practice of castration without anaesthetic, or restrained identically but not castrated (i.e., sham-castrated). In Experiment 1 we measured how calling changed during the different stages of the procedure, and in Experiments 2 and 3 we measured the effect of different restraint techniques. Piglets that were castrated produced significantly more high frequency calls ( >1000 Hz) than sham castrates in all three experiments. In Experiment 1, …

Less Meat, Less Misery: Reforming Factory Farms, Henry Spira

Farm Animal Campaign

No abstract provided.

The New Ethic For Animals And The Dairy Industry, Bernard Rollin

Morality and Ethics of Industrial Farming Collection

There is an unfortunate tendency on the part of those who use animals to dismiss the new social concern with animal treatment as the irrational ravings of tofu-eating, ginseng-guzzling, urban wimps and bunny-hugging extremists.“Animal welfare is what we already do; animal rights if what they want us to do,” one animal scientist said, neatly summarizing the situation. However, what is of paramount importance is that “they” are not just a band of radicals; the new ethic for animals has taken root among society in general. As one cowboy in Kingsville, Texas put it to me:“Hell, Doc, if it were just …

Animal Production And The New Social Ethic For Animals, Bernard E. Rollin

Animal Welfare Collection

No abstract provided.

Animal Welfare, Animal Rights And Agriculture, Bernard E. Rollin

Animal Welfare Collection

The past decade has witnessed a major revolution in social concern with animals. Philosophically, this revolution entails a significant revision in traditional ways of conceiving our mod obligations to other creatures. Therefore, it is necessary to understand the social and conceptual basis for what is widely termed “animal rights.” The agricultural community has mistakenly tended to dismiss this new thinking as tkinge and emotionally based. In actuality, it is a natural extension of earlier social thought. The case of new laws regulating biomedical research illustrates the rapidity of social change in this area, as do recent developments in European regulation …

Pressuring Perdue, Barnaby J. Feder

Profiles

Henry Spira, a moderate among animal-rights activists, aims now at the barnyard.

The Psychology And Ethics Of Humane Equine Treatment, Sharon E. Cregier

Equines Collection

The effect on animals of man-induced stressors, such as the disruption of herd bonds, stabling, medication procedures and the like, has been the subject of increasing investigation. Obvious and shocking abuses against animals, bullfighting, certain training practices in the racehorse industry, and rodeo events such as wild horse races, steerbusting or calf-roping, are readily recognized and have, in some instances been stopped. (Steerbusting refers to roping, from horseback, of running cattle in such a manner as to flip the animal backward or jerk it down, knocking the wind out of the animal and occasionally breaking ribs, vertebrae, and neck.)

However, …

The Case For Intensive Farming Of Food Animals, Stanley E. Curtis

Agribusiness Collection

Our world is still a hungry place. At the same time, the number of people worldwide who grow food for themselves continues to dwindle. Most U.S. citizens have never set foot on a farm or harvested one mouthful-let alone a lifetime's worth-of daily bread. Yet our farmlands and climates and our agricultural and food industries are this nation's ultimate resources. By increasing productivity, our farmers and the scientific and business endeavors that support our nation's food production, processing, and distribution have proved to be able and reliable husbands of these precious resources. But make no mistake: The challenge to increase …

Horsebreakers, Tamers, And Trainers: An Historical, Psychological, And Social Review, Sharon E. Cregier

Equines Collection

To my knowledge, there has been no organized synthesis describing the historical development of horse handling, management, lore, and training. This discussion offers, in capsule form, some of the historical, psychological, and social considerations which might be taken into account when evaluating horse-handling skills.

First, I would like to describe the natures of the emotional and psychological bonds between man and horse. I will also look at the consequences of various types of bonding on horsemanship or management. We can increase our understanding of the role of the horse in our history and lives by thus seeing how the animal …

The Case Against Intensive Farming Of Food Animals, Linda D. Mickley, Michael W. Fox

Agribusiness Collection

The well-being of American agriculture is indeed a complex subject, fraught with interrelationships, predictions, recriminations, and at times, high emotionalism. In this paper, we will be concentrating on several aspects of the entire picture that we feel are fundamental to the issue of animal welfare in modern agriculture. First, we will take a brief look at two farm animal species maintained in very restrictive systems, that is, battery-caged laying hens and tethered and/or crated brood sows.

Next, the human costs in terms of occupational diseases and consumer health hazards will be considered. Finally, some humane alternatives to the factory systems …

The Definition, Current Knowledge And Implementation Of Welfare For Farm Animals--A Personal View, Ron Kilgour

Agribusiness Collection

Being humane to farm animals (welfare) must include (1) having a sound knowledge of their normal and anomalous behavior responses in a farm context and heeding this in a practical way and (2) adopting handling procedures which elicit minimal distress in the species concerned. Building up an ethogram of predictable responses and recording the patterns of behavior during key events, mating, birth, and care of the young are essential. There are still gaps in the recorded ethograms offarm animals. Objective measurements of distress, including an index of its seriousness, are also a priority.

The results from animal preference tests can …

Evils Of Modern Stables, James Irvine Lupton

Equines Collection

Portions of veterinarian James Irvine Lupton's book on horse management that deal with the problems of confinement husbandry practices have been selected as a significant historical record of humane concerns that were documented one hundred years ago. While the author's descriptive prose may lack scientific "objectivity," it does express a common sense morality and the subjective and intuitive observations and conclusions of an experienced veterinarian who clearly respects and understands the horse. His words bespeak of a bygone era where the care or husbandry of animals was both an art and a science, a discipline based upon empathy, compassion and …

The Behavior Of Confined Calves Raised For Veal: Are These Animals Distressed?, M. Kiley-Worthington

Ethology Collection

The behavior of 12 calves confined in crates was recorded at 1-minute intervals for 12-hour periods. These recordings were made at fortnightly intervals from approximately 2 to 16 weeks of age. In all, 864 hours of observations were recorded.

The activities that were performed and the amount of time spent doing each are outlined. Circadian rhythms were controlled largely by feeding time, although there was a difference between diurnal and nocturnal behavior. Individual calves vaned tn how they adapted to the restricted environment. Individual personality profiles and data on the ontogeny of behavior under these conditions are presented.

At 10 …

Hsus Veal Campaign Takes Off

Close Up Reports

Through our action packet, which includes a fact sheet describing how veal calves are raised in this country, an action sheet showing what you can do to help, and bright yellow cards to leave when you dine out explaining why you didn't choose veal, you can help get the word out.

It is clear that our efforts to reform milk-fed veal production methods in the U.S. are already producing results. Shortly after our New York Times ad appeared, a large farm group paid to have its own ad published in response. Agricultural trade papers have warned their readers against our …

The Economics Of Farm Animal Welfare, A. J. F. Webster

Agribusiness Collection

The number of ways that one can be nice or nasty to animals are legion. This article will consider only one very specific aspect of farm animal welfare, namely, those systems of intensive animal production in which the system itself, irrespective of the quality of the stockmanship within the system, appears to restrict the normal behavior of farm animals to an unacceptable degree. The systems that were considered by the House of Commons Select Committee on Agriculure (1981) include egg production from hens in battery cages, production of veal from calves deprived of solid food and isolated in wooden crates, …

Hsus Uncovers Cruel Puppy Mills

Close Up Reports

It is estimated that puppy mills grind out more than half a million puppies every year to be sold almost exclusively in pet stores. But it is not only puppies--who, after all, escape the squalor and crowding after six or seven weeks that suffer. Of equal concern is the fate of the puppy mill breeding stock-living, breathing, feeling adult dogs-used to produce these "valuable" puppies. These dogs often are forced to spend their entire lives in cramped cages or pens, with not enough food or water and no shade from the scorching midwestern sun or shelter from the brutal winter …

Farm Animal Welfare: Some Economic Considerations, Frances Turner, John Strak

Agribusiness Collection

Farmers, just like other businessmen, attempt to produce a saleable product at the least possible cost to themselves. In this way they hope to assure themselves of some profit, and hence to earn a living. In itself this profit motive cannot be criticized, but in attempting to maintain their profits, farmers have adopted more intensive systems of animal production. In turn, the benefits from farmers using these new techniques have accrued to consumers in the form of relatively less expensive food. Clearly, by restricting the use of factory farming methods (which are associated with lower unit costs of production) there …

Farm Animal Welfare: Some Opinions, Michael W. Fox

Agribusiness Collection

The subject of farm animal welfare has evoked a wide range of responses from those involved in the livestock industry and those concerned about the humaneness of intensive husbandry farming practices. Books have been published on the subject as well as a large number of articles in professional and popular magazines. Three international symposia dealing with animal rights have been held in the last two years and a major European conference dealing with farm animal welfare and involving veterinarians, farmers, animal scientists and animal welfare groups was held in Amsterdam in 1979.

In the U.K., a governmental Farm Animal Welfare …

Productivity And Farm Animal Welfare, Michael W. Fox

Agribusiness Collection

In the search for and debate over objective indices of farm animal welfare, productivity is regarded by many animal scientists and others in the livestock industry as the most reliable measure of an animal's overall well-being and adaptability. On the surface, this would seem to be so, as productivity--in terms of growth rate, milk yield, feed-conversion and egg production--can be easily quantified. However, there are serious flaws in this assumption.

The Involvement Of The Farm Animal Veterinarian In Animal Welfare, David G. Llewellyn

Veterinary Science and Medicine Collection

The farm animal practitioner has always played a dual role. The primary role is humanitarian, concerned with the well-being of the livestock, and the secondary role relates to the economics of the enterprise.