My name is 6529 and I was born a U.S. factory farm dairy cow.
After that they brought me to a small plastic cage lined up with dozens of others outside the barn and left me there, still wet from afterbirth.
Everywhere around me I could hear the sounds of other freezing and dying calves, and once in a while I could even hear the sad sounds of mothers from the barns calling to their calves.
I slept tethered to the crate on a cold floor with frozen earth underneath, and when the winds blew (which was often!) I would sometimes shiver until I thought for sure I was going to freeze to death.
Once a day farm employees would come out and force me to drink an awful liquid. They would open a vent on the top of my cage and would thrust down a tube and would force it down my throat. Boy would I gag- but they didn’t care, and sometimes they would shove it down until my throat was raw. I was always hungry and cried a lot those days.
How I survived my infancy I’ll never know, but as soon as the weather cleared, they gave me a three foot around fence to ‘walk’ around in. Still, I didn’t get to do much walking with such tight quarters!
As I grew I began to notice that the sights and sounds of the other dairy calves in the crates were less and less, and I noticed, more often then not, times in which the farm hands would go to a nearby cage and would pull out a crying calf and drag it away, never to be seen again.
Finally one day one of the farm hands came with a collar that he put around my neck and he pulled me out of my once secure little crate area. I had grown too big for it anyway, and so I was happy when they moved me into a big barn with dozens of other adolescent calves. Though it was still tight in the larger hutches, at least I wasn’t outside or alone anymore!
I continued living in this wooden prison, eating ground up something and drinking fly infested water, until at last I was grown. My calf friends continued to disappear as I grew, and some had to be dragged away, but still somehow the people in charge overlooked me.
But because he was a male he was immediately taken away and killed. I know this because I saw him die right out of the corner of my eye from a blow to the head a farm hand inflicted on him.
My name was 6529, did you know my mother also had a name for me- I used to hear it once in a while from across the field- it was Beloved. At least she treasured my short time on Earth.
All images are from Google Search: Dairy Calf/Cow Abuse
"[A] Channel 4 programme, featuring farmer Jimmy Doherty, was explaining how more than 90,000 male dairy calves are shot at birth every year because there is no market for them."
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2152402/Viewers-outrage-harrowing-scenes-day-old-calves-shot.html#ixzz1wRgk7fPP
"Around 700,000 calves are slaughtered for veal in the U.S. each year."
"In natural conditions, cows can live for over 20 years. But in the dairy industry, after being forced to produce unnatural quantities of milk for 2-4 years straight, dairy cows begin to decline in milk production, at which point they are slaughtered for ground beef, used mostly for hamburgers. Of the roughly 9 million dairy cows in the U.S., nearly 3 million cows are milked each year to the point of exhaustion, then slaughtered."
Farm products mentioned in the above story are detailed in this website from a U.S. farm products company" http://intranet.accelgen.com/Farm%20Products/Calf%20Care/Calf_Care_default.aspx
The only time I remember seeing my mother was when I was born and was pulled out of her warm body by farm hands.
It was winter and I got so cold that night that I thought I was going to die.
Everywhere around me I could hear the sounds of other freezing and dying calves, and once in a while I could even hear the sad sounds of mothers from the barns calling to their calves. I slept tethered to the crate on a cold floor with frozen earth underneath, and when the winds blew (which was often!) I would sometimes shiver until I thought for sure I was going to freeze to death.
Once a day farm employees would come out and force me to drink an awful liquid. They would open a vent on the top of my cage and would thrust down a tube and would force it down my throat. Boy would I gag- but they didn’t care, and sometimes they would shove it down until my throat was raw. I was always hungry and cried a lot those days.
How I survived my infancy I’ll never know, but as soon as the weather cleared, they gave me a three foot around fence to ‘walk’ around in. Still, I didn’t get to do much walking with such tight quarters!
As I grew I began to notice that the sights and sounds of the other dairy calves in the crates were less and less, and I noticed, more often then not, times in which the farm hands would go to a nearby cage and would pull out a crying calf and drag it away, never to be seen again.
I sure feared that it could be me next, but somehow they let me grow.
Soon I got used to the cramped quarters, though most of the time my feces and urine was all around me. Oh, the flies that Spring- I thought I was going to scratch myself to death at times!
Then a day came when I was moved to a strange new barn where they shoved tools up my uterus and impregnated me with my first calf. Though I didn’t like the way they did it, I sure was happy when my baby boy was born!
What an awful day that was for me!
But the horrors were just beginning for me, as then my swollen teats were hooked up to a mechanical machine. I was forced to continue standing for the duration as they pumped out my precious milk week after week, month after month. Some other dairy cows weren’t as strong as I was and they eventually fell in their small pens and were sometimes kicked by the farm hands until they either got up or were dragged out, never to be seen again.
But the horrors were just beginning for me, as then my swollen teats were hooked up to a mechanical machine. I was forced to continue standing for the duration as they pumped out my precious milk week after week, month after month. Some other dairy cows weren’t as strong as I was and they eventually fell in their small pens and were sometimes kicked by the farm hands until they either got up or were dragged out, never to be seen again.
I was impregnated 3 more times and was never far from the awful milking machine for my entire 2 years of adulthood. Many times snow or rain blew in through the cracks and nearly froze my unprotected hooves, and I cried in pain, but nothing ever changed except my stall mates who continued to mysteriously disappear.
Then the day finally came when it was my turn, and the farmhands disconnected me from the awful milking machine and led me out of the cramped stall. I thought I was free! What a glorious feeling, though it only lasted a few minutes, for after being penned up for so long, I was too weak to walk.
Soon I was dragged to a waiting truck and beaten with heavy rods and pushed into the back, along with several other sick and weakened cows, and was driven away from the farm to an even darker place.
Soon I was dragged to a waiting truck and beaten with heavy rods and pushed into the back, along with several other sick and weakened cows, and was driven away from the farm to an even darker place.
The end of my short, tortured life was a relief to my broken spirit. It would have been nice to have been put to sleep, but giant machines made the hideous job painful and excruciating to my last breath.
My name was 6529, did you know my mother also had a name for me- I used to hear it once in a while from across the field- it was Beloved. At least she treasured my short time on Earth.
All images are from Google Search: Dairy Calf/Cow Abuse
"[A] Channel 4 programme, featuring farmer Jimmy Doherty, was explaining how more than 90,000 male dairy calves are shot at birth every year because there is no market for them."
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2152402/Viewers-outrage-harrowing-scenes-day-old-calves-shot.html#ixzz1wRgk7fPP
"Around 700,000 calves are slaughtered for veal in the U.S. each year."
"In addition to the misery of repeatedly having their calves taken from them, dairy cows suffer high rates of disease and injury, as well as emotional anguish from poor and restrictive environments. Over 90% of dairy cows are confined in primarily indoor operations, with between 75 and 90% being tethered by the neck in indoor stalls. (3) Cows kept in tie-stalls are confined except when they are milked, severely restricting natural activities"
Farm products mentioned in the above story are detailed in this website from a U.S. farm products company" http://intranet.accelgen.com/Farm%20Products/Calf%20Care/Calf_Care_default.aspx
