We had a thread last week about a new horse slaughter house in Texas I think. I wish I could add this onto that, but no search. I heard the autistic professor interviewed on the radio a few years ago and had trouble believing it, but this is the second time I've seen it so it must be true. http://www.latimes.com/news/nationw...r29,1,4943129.story?coll=la-home-todays-times Killing Them Softly Voluntary reforms in the livestock industry have changed the way animals are slaughtered. Critics say needless suffering still exists. By Stephanie Simon, Times Staff Writer LITTLE ROCK, Ark. -- Chained upside down by their hooves, blood spurting from the jugular, the hogs were supposed to be dead, or at least unconscious, as the conveyor belt rolled them along to be gutted. Now and then, though, one would rear back and strain to right itself. No one made much fuss. The animals would be sliced for sausage within minutes. If a few left the kill floor still aware, still kicking -- well, that was how slaughterhouses operated. Then Jim Stonehocker heard a speech that changed the way his hogs die. A competitor in the meat business was talking about stewardship -- about how to make good sausage, and good profits, while treating animals with dignity, so they die without terror and as much as possible, without pain. "I'm always going to have meat at the center of my plate. I'm always going to wear a leather belt. But we can treat these animals with more respect," said Stonehocker, who runs the sausage company Odom's Tennessee Pride. "In my mind, 'humane slaughter' was an oxymoron. I've had my awakening." So have many of his colleagues across the food industry. A revolution in livestock handling in recent years has improved the lives and the deaths of millions of animals -- most dramatically on the kill floors that handle cows and pigs, but also in farmyards, hen houses and even transport trucks. The reforms are voluntary. Yet they have gained the momentum to become standard in much of the food industry. Many restaurants will not buy burger patties from a slaughterhouse that sends its cows to the kill floor bellowing in fear. Many supermarkets will not buy eggs from a farmer who cuts off hens' beaks to stop them from pecking one another. "Customers used to tell us what they wanted to eat. Now they tell us how they want it produced," said Ken Klippen, a vice president of United Egg Producers, a trade group based in Alpharetta, Ga. . . . The changing approach to animal welfare has its roots in a 1996 federal study. The USDA hired Temple Grandin, an animal scientist at Colorado State University, to inspect two dozen meat-processing plants across the nation. She announced her visits in advance. Still, she found suffering that appalled her. By federal law, animals are supposed to be knocked unconscious so they feel no pain before slaughter. With cows and pigs, that's often accomplished by shooting a retractable bolt into their brains. At two-thirds of the beef plants she inspected, Grandin noted that the bolt guns were not working or not being used properly. Many cows suffered repeated shots to the brain -- or remained conscious as they moved down the line to be dismembered. Grandin found similar failings in one-third of the pork plants. Even before they got to the kill floor, animals were in pain, stumbling on slippery floors and piling on one another in fear. One plant had to prod 80% of its hogs with a mild shock to get them walking. Grandin realized that it was not enough to tell workers to treat animals humanely. They would need quantifiable performance standards: Don't prod more than 25% of pigs. Don't let more than 1% of cattle slip. She set those benchmarks, based on the highest standards a handler could be expected to meet day in and day out. Then she trained workers to measure up. Grandin, who is autistic, says she perceives the world as a series of images, much as a farm animal would. Crawling through chutes on her knees, she has an uncanny ability to pick out the mundane sights and sounds that can stress an animal into hysteria -- the glint of a metal chain, the hiss of an air vent, the motion of a worker's hard hat bobbing in and out of view. To their amazement, producers found that removing those distractions calmed the livestock. The animals no longer balked, so their handlers didn't need to swat them on the rump or zap them with an electric prod to get them moving. Grandin also urged the installation of non-slip flooring so livestock wouldn't trip. After meat producers carried out her suggestions, Grandin used audits to show them how much they improved. Her objective, numbers-based analysis caught fire in an industry long wary of even discussing animal welfare. . . . "We thought abuse was someone beating an animal," McConnell said. "We didn't realize. We didn't know." Odom's Tennessee Pride does things differently now. Hogs are unloaded as soon as they arrive, into cool pens with long troughs of water. If they can't walk, they are euthanized on the spot. "There has been a cultural change here," said production manager Leonardo Ruiz. On the kill floor, workers no longer shoot the hogs in the brain with retractable bolts. Instead, they clap a harness over the animal's head and back and deliver an electric charge. A computerized display lets them know if they're getting a "good stun" or if they need to reposition the harness. Some hogs squeal when the stun is applied. Others jerk. All go rigid in seconds as the electrical impulse induces cardiac arrest. When the harness is lifted, the animals slump, flaccid and unblinking, and roll down onto a conveyor belt. A second worker checks for signs of consciousness and then quickly slits the throat. Everyone on the kill floor knows they could be fired if they let a hog suffer. "They're good animals," worker Lionel Allen said. "We try to treat them right." edit begin Just wanted folks to see the information, not trying to start a vegan/meat controversy... I love meat
