Who knew shooting an animal with a captive bolt pistol-- designed to catastrophically damage the cerebrum, part of the cerebellum, upon penetrating the cranium--might work and then again might not? "My supervisor told me she was dubbing my coworker 'Two-Shot' in light of the fact he rarely kills the sow with one bolt," says Mike.
Working in a hot, fly and manure infested hog barn amid screams of 2,784 sows, 483 sows with litters, 864 gilts, 5,400 nursery pigs and 15 boars could make anyone snap. But some of the workers sound snapped before working at Country View.
One told Mike he prays to run over animals on the highway and was looking forward to bolting a prolapsed sow because "I just feel like killing something." Another worker swung a ruptured pig into the gas cart telling it with glee to "die, %#@&," employing a racial epithet.
Veterinarians viewing the Country View video cite disturbing violations of their profession's oath.
"There are dead piglets in the farrowing crates, and one moribund piglet is captured on video in her last minutes of life," says Illinois veterinarian Debra Teachout. "She is in trembling and in lateral recumbency, respirations are shallow and gasping, eye is swollen and shut. There is a large lesion on her face, and suggests that she is dying of sepsis. This piglet should never have been allowed to get to this point without medical intervention."
"The pig seizuring in the stall unattended is nightmarish, as is the sloppy use of the captive bolt," says Bernard Rollin, PhD, Distinguished Professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University and Pew Commission member. "The gas 'euthanasia' using CO2 is widespread in the industry. It is horrendous, as the animals suffocate and experience major fear and distress."
Nor is it possible to overlook the animals' intelligence, says Mike who found a sow had liberated herself and her litter from her crate by loosening steel pegs in two different places. "I told a co-worker this story and she said that when a sow figures out how to unlock her crate, she often goes around unlocking all of the other crates as well," wrote Mike.
Pigs also can jump hoops, bow, stand, spin, "speak" on command, roll out a rug, herd sheep, play videogames and use mirrors to find food, reports New York Times science columnist Natalie Angier. They "like being touched and petted," says Mike.
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