A new report from Farm Sanctuary, the nation's leading farm animal protection organization, reveals the conditions cattle endure under the care of the beef industry. The Welfare of Cattle in Beef Production assesses published scientific evidence concluding that the U.S. cattle industry has failed to set meaningful standards for the care and handling of beef cattle, or to take a stand in opposition to any of the various practices that result in physical or behavioral problems for the animals. The industry has also failed to implement any type of welfare audit system for cattle operations and no federal laws protect the welfare of beef cattle in the U.S., other than the Humane Method of Slaughter Act that requires the stunning of livestock before slaughter.
At the beginning of the last century, steer were four or five years of age at slaughter. By the 1950s, cattle were killed at two to three years of age. Today, pumped full of antibiotics, chemicals and hormones to unnaturally promote growth, beef cattle are slaughtered at an average 14 to 16 months, with only the first six to eight months spent on pasture land. The rest of their lives are spent on feedlots – virtual cattle cities with up to 115,000 inhabitants – where they are fattened on an unnatural grain and supplemental protein diet, the cause of two serious digestive disorders found in cattle at feedlots.
"Because these animals spend the first months of their lives in pasture, the raising of beef cattle is often viewed as the least problematic of all modern animal production systems. Unfortunately, this couldn't be further from the truth," said Gene Bauston, president of Farm Sanctuary. "The feedlot is essentially just another factory farming model, comparable to drylots for dairy cows, battery cages for laying hens or confined feeding operations for pigs. All of these animals are confined to crowded quarters, fed an unnatural diet, mutilated to make handling easier, and loaded with antibiotics and hormones within a system that views them merely as economic units of production."
Cattle feedlots are mainly located in the central U.S. near areas of high grain production and slaughter plants. Over 70% of all cattle finished in the U.S. are fed in just three states – Nebraska, Kansas and Texas. Crammed into pens that are rarely cleaned or protected from the elements, cattle stand in mud and waste and breathe in noxious fumes. In fact, over 15% of cattle at large feedlots suffer from respiratory disease.
Cattle are subjected to mutilations including castrations and dehorning, almost always without the benefit of pain relief, and are typically branded with a hot or freezing iron. The animals are handled and moved by aversive techniques, such as hitting and shocking with electrical prods. Shipped on crowded vehicles without access to food, water or rest, beef cattle are trucked from farm to auction, from auction to feedlot, and from feedlot to slaughterhouse before reaching grocery store shelves.
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