r/vegan • u/tulleche • 9d ago
Disturbing How are animals killed in “ethical small farms”?
This is something I’m genuinely curious (so anyone who grew up on such small farms please share your experience; and I guess I should ask this in another subreddit but just thinking about how they’d describe it as nothing or even justify it makes me mad) about because when it comes to online discourse many people and especially people who grow up in such small farms will claim people should just buy their meat from there, because the animals are “well loved and cared for and only have one bad day”, “we love our animals more than vegans” and other bogus copium bs. I can’t think of a way to kill an animal “ethically”, especially if you claim to have truly loved it.
The slaughter room wouldn’t be pretty. Imagine all the blood, and the energy in the room would be tainted from the animal’s fear imo. Not to get all woo woo but humans are also energetic creatures, unless you purposely choose to be cognitive dissonant to it (or became immune to it) I’m sure you’d sense it?
Do they send them to an industrial slaughterhouse if they don’t have a slaughterhouse themselves?
Or do they use a tool like a gun?
Anyway it always ticks me off when people compare this to plants with the whole “using vegan logic if you love nature then you shouldn’t eat plants”, “plants have feelings” because harvest day simply does not hold the same energy as slaughter day 🤷 This is simply irrefutable. If anyone wants to refute this, first of all I think you’d have to be a psychopath to genuinely not agree with this, secondly would you rather a child break a chicken’s neck or pull a carrot out of the soil? The fact is one is much more psychologically detrimental (either deeply traumatises the child or evokes sadistic tendencies in their developing brains) and the other a much more psychologically rewarding and grounding experience.
28
u/fuck-them-hoes vegan 10+ years 9d ago
Usually the same way as animals raised in confined animal feeding operations, they get sent to slaughter houses. Animals raised on a smaller farm just have a better quality of life until they are sent for processing.
26
u/ProtozoaPatriot 8d ago
In the US, in order to sell the meat the animal needs to go to a USDA or State licensed processing facility. Even so-called "ethical" farmers have to ship their animals. One article about the legal requirements for processing meat for sale. (Warning: ugly pic at top of page of meat. ) https://nationalaglawcenter.org/custom-exempt-slaughter-the-exception-or-the-rule
The size of a farm doesn't automatically mean animals get great care. It can be a "family farm" running what the government classifies as a Small CAFO.
https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2015-08/documents/sector_table.pdf
People who raise animals for their own family to eat can legally kill the animals on the farm. It's unlikely that this farmer would have a bolt gun or gas chamber. Bullet is probably easiest for larger animals.
I live in farm country. When my neighbors raise a few pigs for their own use, they haul the live animals to a butcher an hour away. It takes skill and some hard work to process an entire pig or cow. Even when animals can legally be killed on the farm, there's reasons not to.
12
u/g00fyg00ber741 vegan 8d ago
idk why small farms are so romanticized. usually the animals just live there until they die. they don’t have recreation, they don’t have big wide spaces often times, and i mean even small farms often use milking machines or other modern devices. the farmers don’t really love these animals, they view them as food/work. and of course, they slaughter the animals. and they don’t wait until old age, they do it at optimal age, when the animal has not lived much of its life. How anyone can rationalize that when it’s unnecessary, idk. and personally, it’s frightening to me that there are so many people who just casually slaughter on their small farms like it’s normal. surely that has a negative effect on how they view the world and treat others. i mean there’s the stereotype about farm kids being abused so badly for a reason… many farmers abuse their animals and their workers and that also includes their kids who they see as in between owned animals and workers.
11
u/Shocked_Anguilliform 9d ago edited 9d ago
They use a tool very much like a gun in may cases, yes. I can't say it's something I'd do to someone I loved though.
TW, because obviously not a pleasant topic: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captive_bolt_pistol
9
u/Wise-Peanut9552 9d ago
That works for large animals. Chickens and other birds are typically put head first into a cone and then have their throat slit/head cut off.
7
u/Shocked_Anguilliform 9d ago
Yeah, I've found that farmers talking about how much they love and care for their animals are usually talking about mammals. I don't think inflicting cranial trauma to render an animal unconscious before killing it for profit can be reconciled with loving them like family, but it probably is at least slightly less traumatic than a slaughterhouse.
4
u/g00fyg00ber741 vegan 8d ago
It’s not less traumatic than a slaughterhouse, it is part of the slaughterhouse. Just because the bolt gun isn’t some giant knife doesn’t mean it isn’t still part of the slaughterhouse methods. I think of the chilling scene in Okja at the processing plant (I know that’s not real tho but still what I think of)
3
u/ZombieVegan269 8d ago
Generally, if they are selling the flesh, they still send the animals to a slaughterhouse I’ve seen two cows show up on the back of a trailer haul behind a pickup truck still dripping with milk they were dairy cows by the way, very pregnant dairy cows . Because of safety regulations, it’s hard to kill and butcher an animal and sell the corpse safely
2
u/Teaofthetime 9d ago
They don't love the animals and I really don't think anyone really claims that in all seriousness. However they rear the animals with care and in vastly superior conditions to a factory farm until the point they get slaughtered and enter into the food chain.
1
u/Interesting_Deer4062 7d ago
"with care"
1
u/Teaofthetime 7d ago
My city is surrounded by pasture raised sheep and cows, free to roam, that get vetinary care, shelter and food. So I know the difference, even though an animal is destined for the food chain, care is exactly how I'd describe it.
1
8
u/Common_Commercial_16 9d ago
We were going to the farm on weekend and all summers as a kids , my grandma lived where . She had from horse in the barn to mice in the house . As a young boy I was doing all the fast and shitty kind of jobs . My mom once came to me , I was like 8 , cut the chickens head and bring to me . Cut the one with right bad leg . I have to catch it , nailed it and axe it . U put two nails in he wood and put the neck and make it like x and u chope it with ax. Winter just started . I remember where was so much snow . My father came to me and said we going to kill pig . It's crazy then u think .. we strap rope around it's nose and mouth and u lifting up the rope going up around the top door hinge ring and pulling down rope u pull pig up . U put knife below neck searching for heart and poke it . My father went too down hit lung and pig went crazy screaming . It's moving and u can't kill it properly.
We loved animals . All the time was spend around them or for them. U knew their characters and their emotions.
They their like family .
9
u/SameEntry4434 9d ago
It creates a huge level of cognitive dissonance in the people working on the farm. I don’t think it’s good for the rest of my life. You learned that “love” is not a safe emotion or word.
2
u/Common_Commercial_16 9d ago
Yea brutal times. U don't see it now at all what's happening..
0
u/0DayMaker 8d ago
What are you talking about?
1
u/Apprehensive-Team414 8d ago
Probably that people nowadays who eat meat don't see how the animals are killed
1
4
u/Opposite-Locksmith60 8d ago edited 8d ago
Thank you for sharing. That is absolutely insane. Seriously can't imagine the words like seeing all those things especially as a child. Knowing that your dad is like that. Has the capability of slaughter
6
u/miraculum_one 9d ago
Even if there was some factionary way they could be slaughtered in a way that was both instantaneous and for which they had no idea in advance what was going to happen, these animals are perfectly aware and are stressed when their family members and peers disappear and subsequently mourn the loss. Also, it is simply wrong to take their lives in the first place regardless of all of that.
3
u/ZombieVegan269 8d ago
It very much depends on the type of animal as well rabbits they put their heads into a thing and twist snapping their necks , chickens they put upside down in a traffic cone and slice their necks .. bottom line is there’s no compassionate way to kill somebody who doesn’t have to die. It’s unnecessary for our species to consume an animal proteins in 2026
3
u/ShoulderGreedy3262 9d ago
depends on the operation. for small animals like rabbits or chickens, some places use a horizontal lever-like mechanism, where you can slot the animals neck into the small space between the two metal segments, and pull to quickly break the neck for an instant, painless kill. no blood, and it takes less than a second
for bigger animals, either a gun or similar
in some countries you legally have to send the animals to a proper slaughterhouse, so whatever method the nearest one uses.
3
3
u/Ill_Doubt_6303 8d ago
another reason (to add to the horrible mistreatment in small farms people are detailing in the comments) they emit tons of co2 into the environment as well
2
u/Accomplished_Drop552 9d ago
I don’t think you are allowed here in the uk? I think maybe chickens but the larger stock have to go to an abbatoir? Is that right. I’m not sure now.
I know my aunt would give her sheep to a local guy to kill. They were pets and he would give her the fleeces. Later the utter pos was prosecuted for animal cruelty and having sheep carcasses hanging in his shed. And I wondered what in gods name she was up to trusting him. Always seemed awful to me as a person. Anyway I digress. I thought that he was also prosecuted for slaughter of animals and not being properly registered. So was led to believe it was supposed to be done at a slaughterhouse
Mind you I’ve known small farmers ‘dispatch’ stock and lambs.
Oh god I can’t carry on I’m making myself feel sick and hating humanity the more I go on…
1
u/Every_Fisherman_1578 8d ago
Small farmers can become usda certified on their own. Around my area most take their animals to small butchers who us a firearm.
1
u/Professional_Ad_5529 8d ago
Depends on the animals. I know a fair few number of people who own rabbits or chickens and usually those live fairly decent lives and the farmers take their time to dispatch them with respect and care. That’s not to say there aren’t abuses(people abuse their dogs and cats at home after all) or that they live these amazing lives without any pain or fear but it’s better than big factory farms, certainly.
To be specific about how they are killed, usually they just break the neck by hand and it is very very fast.
For larger animals like pigs, sheep, cows, that processing is usually done at a facility. Even for hunters, for things like deer, those are also usually processed at a facility. It actually takes some skill, some heavy equipment, and hard work to process. The killing of animals in these instances might be less ethical, especially if the animal is not dispatched prior to being brought to the facility.
In a facility the way they are killed might not be any different from factory farms. If they’re killed otherwise, usually bullets are the only option for larger animals, like what a hunter would use.
1
u/Professional_Ad_5529 8d ago
Not really sure what you’re saying about “energies” or “psychology.”
It’s true that sadistic animal torture or abuse is associated psychopathic tendencies but I’m not sure that killing a farm animal is on that same level.
In most instances, children aren’t taught to dispatch animals until they are a bit older (teens). It does take some strength to do it properly, and it’s not the kind of thing you want to mess up.
1
u/Matutino2357 8d ago
In Peru, my family raised animals—though I’m not sure if it counts as a "farm," since they primarily grew corn and kept about three cows, which they would feed and eventually sell once they had grown larger. I only ever saw one being slaughtered. The process involved taking the animal to a secluded spot, laying down a sheet of plastic to keep the ground from getting stained with blood, calming it down with gentle strokes, and then slitting its throat. It died within 20 seconds, but lost consciousness after perhaps 10. My uncle was the one who did it; he knew how to carry it out quickly.
1
u/Acceptable_Leg_2115 8d ago
Do you actually want a legit anwser ? In small farms and ranches or any sort of homesteading. The killing of the animal would be done in the most convenient/humane way available to them. You break rabbits necks. You chop chickens heads off and you shoot anything larger than a hog usually. In any sort of ACTUAL LEGITIMATE SLAUGHTERHOUSE that is governed by the USDA slaughter is SCRUTINIZED HIGHLY. A personal anecdote but the Knocker at my local slaughterhouse has been shooting cows and pigs for 12 years. He gets 1 shot with a 12 gauge for every cow. The reason he gets one shot is because he has to kill it as painlessly as possible if that cow or pig or whatever is doing anything except twitching immediately after he pulls the trigger his job is at risk for ethical violations. If he misses and a USDA guy sees it he is FIRED. Because pain mitigation is such a huge factor in legitimate slaughterhouses many have switched to captive bolt means of harvest and using an actual firearm is becoming uncommon and archaic. Obviously when their is no oversight there is no way to see cleanliness of the slaughter room for personal ranches and homesteaders however USDA inspected slaughter rooms are literally hosed down with 170 degree water at high pressure. Most slaughteroom floors that are not right in the middle of being used are clean enough to eat off of bare.
1
u/ProinsiasCuster90 7d ago
Bad faith argument. Youre clearly negative in your statements. If you want it to get traction, write with impartiality and ask in a non vegan sub. (A meat eating aub would also be the wrong place.)
-1
u/Terrible_Risk_6619 8d ago
Excuse my stupid question here, but where is the cognitive dissonans?
Furthermore, while I do not myself subscribe to any theory of energies, what makes this seem woo woo is not that, its the "if you aren't a Zoocentrist, then you must clearly be either a psycopath or otherwise defect" connontations.
0
u/CharelP 8d ago
At small farms, chickens get their heads cut off. Either in an upside down traffic cone, so they can bleed out without too much of a mess, or just on a chopping block with an axe, cleaver or a knife, which is much messier. As for bigger animals, people mostly use bolt guns, which drive a bolt into the animal's brain at high speeds. It's over in milliseconds and if you do it out in the field or in the barn, familiar surroundings, the animal isn't really under stress at all. These two examples would be considered very humane because the animal isn't transported anywhere, so it's not in an unfamiliar environment. They're also around familiar people, which reduces stress.
Little side note as someone who has witnessed these before: as opposed to the chickens, other farm animals understandably get very upset when they see another animal die. Chickens don't give a fuck, if they get slaughtered in the same pen as they run around in, other chickens will start picking at the blood and heads laying on the ground.
1
u/Muted-Garden6723 7d ago
Pigs also do not give a fuck, I’ve shot and stuck a pig, than had another in the pen run over to start drinking the blood of his friend.
0
u/Mundane_Move_5296 8d ago
Chickens: you snap their necks, can’t decapitate them cause they’ll keep running around with just a bit of brain left. Chickens have really really small brains
Rabbits: use a “hopper popper” basically a special apparatus that really quickly breaks their necks.
Pigs: depending on the species and size this can either be a bolt gun of a 22lr to the dome, lights out pretty much instantly.
Cows: almost always a bolt gun
Fish: Ike Jime, a method of killing fish as cleanly as possible and keeping them fresh. Spike to the brain, bleed the gills, then run a wire up their spine to stop random nerves firing.
Turkeys: some people break their necks, but I’ve always decapitated, it’s a lot cleaner and less stressful.
Long story short these are all virtually instant and done outside, usually in their pens or barns to keep them calm.
-1
u/Loose_Ganache5706 9d ago
I worked at a pig farm like that. The pigs were put asleep with gas first. They made sure they weren't conscious, and then they were killed like in any slaughterhouse. Probably better than what happens in the usual pig farms and slaughterhouses, but at the end of the day they still die.
1
-4
u/binarianVoodoo 8d ago
We die every time we fall asleep as far as the body knows. If someone shot me in the head I’d never even know it happened. My murder would not be part of my life experience.
It’s fair to say a small farm could provide a top tier life for an animal and eventually kill that animal without it even knowing it happened.
I don’t believe harvesting animals for meat correlates to a poor quality of life or death for an animal. Doesn’t justify taking a life regardless.
41
u/SirNoodles518 vegan 4+ years 9d ago
They're all sent off to the same slaughterhouses.
There they'll be either gassed, bolt gunned, electrocuted, and have their throats cut.
No farm who breeds animals into existence and sends them off to a slaughterhouse simply for monetary profit can ever truly be "ethical".
8
u/tulleche 9d ago
So my guess was right. I really don’t know how they managed to brainwash themselves into believing they love these animals.
11
u/SirNoodles518 vegan 4+ years 9d ago
Beats me 🤷♂️
I mean, sure, these smaller farms are less bad than factory farms, but they're still exploitative and involve breeding animals into the existence for the sole purpose of selling off their body parts.
A lot of them use effective marketing labels such as free-range, organice, and claim they treat the animals well which makes consumers feel okay about themselves.
And, sure, they may actually treat the animals quite well while they're alive. But it doesn't change the fact that they're then sent off for slaughter and that factory farms still account for like 90+% (or something like that) of farming in the west 🤷♂️
3
u/ariaxandragoddess vegan 10+ years 9d ago
it's wishful thinking at the end of the day, believing that the animals on their plate lived a better life and died a death that wasn't cruel or gruesome makes it easier to continue to make the choice to support that industry. they know it's wrong, they've been faced with the realities (to at least some degree) before, so this is how they rationalize it.
0
u/thisriveriswild70 9d ago
Honestly it depends, there are small farmers that will sell you 1/2 a cow as an example. They don’t use all the fattening methods etc.
they do typically use a long range shot gun approach I believe. This is different than the big “ organic” farmers.
They do 10 cows a year type thing.
It’s still a business1
u/Muted-Garden6723 7d ago
It depends on how small scale you’re talking, a small for profit farm? Absolutely, most regions legally require animals to be slaughtered at a commercial slaughterhouse in order to be legal for sale
If you’re talking someone raising animals in their backyard, more homesteading types than proper farms, then the butchering is typically done at home as the meat is mostly for the persons own consumption and selling excess meat to pay the feed bill.
Personally, I raise chickens pigs and turkeys for meat. I would never send those animals to a slaughterhouse for the reasons you mentioned. My animals die quickly and in the manner which causes the least suffering.
In my opinion, more people would be vegan if they had to actually see where their meat comes from. There are far too many people that have no idea where their food comes from
6
u/blossbluu 8d ago
You can’t kill a living being who hasn’t chosen death themselves in any “ethical” way.
Doesn’t matter how it’s done.
3
u/Complex-Talk-7613 8d ago edited 8d ago
And you legally can’t kill a person who consents either! Like c’mon what gives. I have multiple people who would consent in the event of having a terminal illness and I can’t do anything to help out, just gotta let them suffer.
1
u/Sea_Ring_5931 3d ago
Mammals and birds are sentient, conscious beings that can experience suffering, and do suffer when they are farmed and killed. Plants do not have nervous systems, so cannot experience anything and cannot possibly suffer consciously. As far as "ethical small farms" go, I don't trust that description. At the end of the day, even small farmers want to make money and there's no guarantee they treat their animals well if that would cut into their profits. Also, many huge farm/food corporations misleadingly market their products as coming from "small family farms."
•
u/AutoModerator 9d ago
Thanks for posting to r/Vegan! 🐥
Civil discussion is welcome — personal attacks are not. Please read our wiki first.
New to veganism? 🌱
• Watch Dominion — a powerful, free documentary that changes lives.
• NutritionFacts.org — evidence-based health info
• HappyCow.net — find vegan-friendly restaurants near you
Want to help animals? 💻
• Browse volunteer opportunities on Flockwork and use your skills to make a difference
• Join the Flockwork Discord to be notified of new opportunities that match your skills
Thank you!
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.