My first day of work...anybody want to eat beef......?

Well I started my first day of work at the vet clinic. VERY interesting. I was involved in some routine procedures with the small animals...spays, vaccinations and such, but I also got my first taste of veterinary medicine with cattle. Let me tell you, it's NOTHING like small animal medicine. They basically get herded into a small shoot that locks on both ends, with their head caught on the outside of one end. This is a skill....slamming the cattle's head in the door (there is a opening for their head) at just the right time before it gets out. At the same time, the back door needs to be shut so that the next cow can't squeeze in. There is a whole switchboard of sorts that controls all these levers and doors, gates etc. I watched in odd amazement at how the tech moved these cattle along with such ease, because I know it wasn't easy!

The first procedure I got to experience was a heifer that was bloated. Something was upsetting her 3rd stomach and when that happens, they blow up like an inflated balloon. The doctor was very efficient and fast. Within seconds he had made his incision and rammed a tube type device called a trocar, into the stomach, to relieve the air. Once it was in, there was a fast and constant fssssstt of air moving out of the stomach, and I watched as the cow literally deflated. A cow deflated!! I watched the cow decrease to less than half of the size it had been only a few seconds earlier.

NEXT, I got to watch 7 heifers get vaccinated, tagged and tattooed. Same as before...cattle go into cattle grates...one moves into single shoot with it's head sticking out. As efficiently as before and fast (because cows don't hold very still) the doctor vaccinated, tagged the ear and tattooed the ear, with the vaccination info. One by one, the cattle would be released from the shoot to head outside and almost every single cow slipped and slammed hard on the wet cement. There were a few, I noticed, that seemed more intelligent. Instead of going warp speed, they would carefully walk out of the cattle shoot and very gently tiptoe outside, as if they knew that if they weren't light on their feet, that they would fall. When cows fall, they fall hard! If a horse fell the way these cows were falling, there would have been broken body parts.

Here I was, the "new" girl, flinching and ooing and ouching every time one of them would fall and slam there way out of the barn. Everyone else was just talking over the commotion about such things as sports or telling jokes because this is an everyday occurrence to them. They are used to it.

I was prepared today to see veterinary medicine in a whole new light. I knew that cattle were not treated the same as our dog and cat friends, but today, almost all of the treatment of the cattle was appalling to me. The way they are treated is a bit hard to swallow. Cattle are not pets. They are animals with a purpose....for us to eat them right? Which brings me to vaccinations and antibiotics. Cattle up here are required to be vaccinated for certain viruses and diseases. The vaccine today (I'll get the name of it) in it's "live" form, that was injected into the cows, is highly dangerous for woman, because it causes woman to abort. YUP it causes abortions in humans. Most of the woman who work in the clinic won't go near it. I know... it's just a vaccination right?.....but that does get injected into the muscle and circulates into the body of the cattle. It's probably given once a year or every 3 years until that cattle gets slaughtered. Do I really want to be eating something that is injected with something so toxic it can cause a woman to abort her baby? Yea not so sure. Of course, with the world getting over populated, it's apparent it doesn't have that affect on woman when they eat beef. HA! Even so, what if it does have an affect? What if it's causing other harmful things to happen in our bodies? I just can't imagine that over time, it would be good for us. This vaccine is just one of the vaccines it's given, not to mention the antibiotics injected into it, in it's lifetime.


Anybody for a Big Mac?

ALSO...
Free range and/or organic doesn't necessarily mean they cows are treated humanely. The cattle up here have it good, considering some of the living conditions I've seen cows living in down in California and Arizona. Many are free range up here. They have 1oo's of acres to live on. Green rolling hills......
BUT!...The heifer this morning, treated for her bloated stomach, was wide awake while the incision was made and while the tube was shoved into her stomach. She had no anesthetics, no pain relievers. She just had to tough it out. Hard to watch.

Later in the afternoon was the removing horns and castrating event of the day. 6 bulls were brought in to be debudded or dehorned and to be castrated. This involves the bull going into the shoot just like I explained before. Their head is then tied closely to the metal gate, so they can't move, while the doctor saws off the bull horns with a hand saw. The bloody spot where the horn was, is quickly cauterized with a hot branding rod. Meanwhile, while they are being de-horned there is someone else in the back end placing a large rubber band on their testicles. This rubber band placed around their testicles, will slowly cut off blood circulation for the next few weeks until their balls basically rot and fall off. Yum!

The procedures on these bulls, were also done with no anesthetics or pain relievers as well. Of course they were crying out and slamming their bodies around the cattle shoot because it frickn' hurt! If you want to know more about dehorning or disbudding, which is still unregluated in the U.S., go to http://www.avma.org/reference/backgrounders/dehorning_cattle_bgnd.asp. In the end, they were injected with antibiotics and sent on their merry, painful ways.

So it's great that Prop 2 was put into effect in California, but it's not good enough for me. Sure it helps to prevent some issues, but cattle and farm animals are still treated so inhumanely. I realize that ranchers sometimes have 3-4 hundred head of cattle and that they can't afford to give the best medical care to every animal, but I'm not going to support that way of getting my food. I didn't eat much red meat before, but I never want to touch it again, now that I know more about the livestock world.

Regardless of whether I stopped eating meat for health or not, (I've gone vegan recently) I just can't see that cattle were put on this planet for us to treat them so horribly, just so we can eat them! We have PLENTY to eat without beef. You would think that if we were going to eat cattle, that we would take better care of them. That would make sense right? We don't grow lettuce and then stomp all over it before we eat it. That wouldn't be very good. At least I don't think so. It's bad enough we spray pesticides all over our green food. Almost every way we eat is so toxic. To add to all this negative info about beef, humans continue to mow down rain forests all over the world to make more pasture land for cattle! I won't get into that.

I don't like the taste of red meat anyway, but I guess if I did, I would feel that my only option would be to raise the cow myself so that I knew how it was being treated. You can buy free range, organic meat, but I think I'd really investigate the farm before I did. Even if the meat was organic and free range, I'd be curious to know how they were dealing with aspects such as castration and horn removing. I don't think animals should have to suffer so we can eat them.
I also don't think we should keep acting like these issues don't exist.

I wonder how I'll deal with this at work. I believe I may be one of the few there that don't work with the cattle. =)



XO