Re: Bird Flu - Denmark
- From: "Pat Gardiner" <patgardiner@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 15 Feb 2006 13:14:45 +0000 (UTC)
" Jill" <newsNOSPAM@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:43f3190b$0$3635$ed2e19e4@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Jill wrote:
Pat Gardiner wrote:
No flu yet, but poultry ordered indoors as of today.
Anyway, the EU vets are meeting today and tomorrow, Britain will be
ordered to put the birds in, no doubt.
As you have so much experience and expertise can you please explain
why this would be advantageous to all the birds in the UK at this
point?
what a surprise - no answer!
It now suits me. Dead Swans found in Denmark, results awaited.
Aren't we lucky. We have the State Veterinary Service to tell us that the
rest of the world don't know what they are doing.
Cue for pictures of the White Cliffs and Battle of Britain music. Britain
stands alone!
or should that be pictures of Edinburgh castle accompanied by bagpipes and
tartan. Scotland the Brave!
PMWS sick pigs and disgusting conditions in Britain's intensive poultry
units, mostly located close together in migration areas.
A typical recent story. Where were the SVS? The company probably had a
company vet, thus protecting them from SVS interest.
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=16682353&method=full&siteid=94762&headline=foul--name_page.html
9 February 2006
FOUL
Battery chickens forced to eat maggots, covered in filth and surrounded by
rotting carcasses of birds
By Stephen Moyes
NEGLECTED battery hens were left to eat maggots, egg shells and dead birds
in an "appalling" case of cruelty.
RSPCA inspectors found more than 1,000 hens with excrement the size of
tennis balls encrusted around their feet.
Shocking film footage revealed some of the birds were stuck fast in the
deep, wet dung. They were forced to eat anything they could find around
them, including the carcasses of many hens which had died.
The inspectors found the birds stranded in the squalid conditions in a
droppings pit at a farm owned by battery egg producer WJ Watkins and Son.
A court heard how the hens had fallen into the pit after escaping from cages
above.
The company yesterday admitted causing the birds to suffer unnecessarily and
was fined £14,500 and ordered to pay £75,000 costs.
It also pleaded guilty to not maintaining cages and failing to inspect hens
daily.
A member of the public had tipped off the RSPCA about conditions at the farm
in September 2004.
Cliff Harrison, of the RSPCA's special operations unit, said: "None of our
inspectors will forget the sight of shed after shed of dead and dying birds.
"Some of the birds were dragging heavy balls of filth on their feet and
others were sinking and dying in the wet excrement. These pits were terrible
places for hens and humans alike. They were the size of a small football
pitch, mostly in total darkness, and one of our inspectors reported 400 dead
birds in just one of the eight sheds we inspected.
"Even with a team of 26 RSPCA inspectors, we were still unable to deal with
the sheer scale of the problem of rescuing hens from the dung pits and we
had to ask the company to get staff to help.
"What we found on that day demonstrates what can happen if things go wrong
in an intensive battery farming system.
"Thorough inspection and immediate attention to welfare problems is
essential.
"I hope this company will never allow these conditions to occur again."
District Judge Kevin Gray said at Southend magistrates court: "Some of the
birds were in appalling conditions and nothing was being done to alleviate
the suffering. It was a case of an inadequate reporting system and
over-stretched staff."
Andrew Day, 32, who managed the farm in Upminster, Essex, for WJ Watkins &
Son, pleaded guilty to causing unnecessary pain to hens, failing to ensure
the welfare of animals, failing to maintain cages to prevent escape and
failing to inspect hens daily.
The firm's national poultry manager, Dean Sykes, 39, admitted permitting
unnecessary pain to hens.
The judge ordered pre-sentence reports on both men and their cases were
adjourned.
David Watkins, managing director of Watkins and Son, was in court as his
firm was fined. The grey-haired executive, wearing a striped tie and suit,
left without comment.
There were 30 million egg laying hens in the UK in 2005. Of total egg
production, 63.3 per cent were from battery hens.
The EU voted in 1999 to phase out battery cages by 2012. But Philip Lymbery,
chief executive of Compassion in World Farming, said: "Sadly, the food
system is geared towards driving down cost. Phasing out cages is not
necessarily a done deal."
A free-range hen lives up to nine years but a battery bird is past its peak
at one.
--
Regards
Pat Gardiner
www.go-self-sufficient.com
--
regards
Jill Bowis
Pure bred utility chickens and ducks
Housing; Equipment, Books, Videos, Gifts
Herbaceous; Herb and Alpine nursery
Working Holidays in Scotland
http://www.kintaline.co.uk
.
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