UPC’s Letter Condemning Hens’ Death in Battery-Cage Buildings in Post-Tribune (IN) Aug. 11
On Aug. 3, 2006, the Post-Tribune in Northwest Indiana reported that between 35,000 and 40,000 battery-caged hens at Rose Acre Farms in Newton County died from excessive heat when the power was intentionally shut off to fight a fire at the farm. Rose Acre Farms president Marcus Rust told the Post-Tribune that shutting off the electricity stopped the airflow in the battery-caged hen houses, causing the hens to die. He said, “Human life is more important than an animal’s life.” UPC’s letter in response ran on Friday Aug. 11.
Regarding “High Temps Fry 35,000 Chickens” by Tom Wyatt, Aug. 3, 2006
The suffering of the Rose Acre Farms hens who died miserably in their cages from unbearable heat is matched only by the callous attitude shown by the company.
Chicken do not perspire, so on hot summer days, they pant with their beaks open, hold their wings away from their bodies, drink plenty of water, and dustbathe beneath a shady tree or bush to cool themselves.
Locked up in cages in stifling buildings filled with toxic ammonia fumes, chickens have no access to nature’s beneficence. The environment in which they evolved to live is missing, and the very effort to cool themselves produces so much added body heat that it kills them.
Professor John Webster of the University of Bristol’s School of Veterinary Science spoke truly when he wrote of industrial chicken production that it is “in both magnitude and severity, the single most severe, systematic example of man’s inhumanity to another sentient animal.” (John Webster, Animal Welfare: A Cool Eye Towards Eden. 1995)
Karen Davis, PhD, President
United Poultry Concerns
United Poultry Concerns, Inc.
PO Box 150
Machipongo, VA 23405-0150
757-678-7875
FAX: 757-678-5070
www.upc-online.org
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