Undercover Investigations // Pigs
Cruel Conditions at a Nebraska Pig Farm
An investigation of a Nebraska pig farm conducted by the Humane Farming Association (HFA) found pigs suffering from extreme neglect and mistreatment. Pigs were kept in metal crates so small that they could barely move and were covered in open sores on their faces, heads, shoulders, backs, and legs from rubbing against the sides of the crates. According to a worker at the farm, “They all have sores … there’s hardly a pig in there who doesn’t have a sore.”
The pigs were emaciated and received little feed because most of it had been thrown on the floor out of their reach or fell through the slats in the floor into the manure pit below. Damaged troughs deprived many pigs of water. A nonfunctioning heating system left the animals freezing in winter temperatures.
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| “I have seen that a lot—I don’t know how many times. Some of those doors have real jagged sharp tin edges. They get their heads caught in there and if the sow happens to back up and lay down or something, it pulls their head off almost.” |
The pigs lived in crates that were caked in feces directly above a pit of their own waste, and many suffered from skin infections caused by the pervasive excrement. The floor was in such a state of disrepair that dozens of piglets had fallen through and drowned in their own excrement. Other piglets got their heads stuck in the bars of their crates and died from the cold or from being crushed. Pigs were observed with abscesses bigger than volleyballs, profusely bleeding wounds, broken legs, missing hooves, and numerous other injuries, none of which was given any treatment.
Many pigs were too wounded to stand and were simply left for weeks or months to die of starvation, dehydration, or infection. One worker reported, “Some of them lay in those crates so long, their legs rot off. … It’s just a real atrocity how many sows that die in that place.” There were buckets of dead piglets covered in maggots in the sheds, and dead sows were left among the living to rot for days.
What You Can Do
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| “There was one downed sow that laid there for close to a month. … The feed got thrown in there. … Feed was piled up on top of her head about two inches thick. The tears from her eye got covered up with feed. Her eye was encrusted with feed. … When she died it was a pretty rotten mess.” |
HFA’s petition fell on deaf ears because state laws are ineffective in protecting farmed animals and the Animal Welfare Act exempts farmed animals entirely. The best thing that you can do to help spare animals from such torture is to stop supporting the industry that allows this cruelty to occur by no longer eating them. Order a free vegetarian starter kit full of delicious recipes. We’ll also include a free DVD.
Investigation after investigation has found egregiously inhumane conditions at factory farms across the country. At Belcross Farm in North Carolina, PETA videotaped a pig having her leg sawed off and her skin peeled off while she was still conscious. At Seaboard Farms in Guymon, Oklahoma, we found dying pigs left on freezing cement for days, pigs who were clubbed in the head, and ammonia levels so high that the animals contracted pneumonia. At Pilgrim’s Pride in West Virginia, workers smashed chickens against cement block walls, stomped on them, and ripped their legs and beaks off while managers casually walked through the area. Farm animals are exempted from any protection under the federal Animal Welfare Act, so their fate rests in your hands.
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