So I'm sitting
here on a cool winter morning, procrastinating on Facebook as usual, when a
friend posted this video:
For those of you who don't know (and I didn't know until this
morning either) that The Gentle Barn is a sanctuary farm on the outskirts of
Los Angeles, California. They have over 160 animals on just six acres.
They "rescue" farm animals (claiming most of them are starved,
tortured, abandoned or from "backyard butchers"). They then ask
for donations to help with the feeding, medical expenses and upkeep of animals.
I must admit they seem to do fantastic work with disadvantaged and
special needs children. I take my hat
off to them for doing such outstanding community service for the children AND
animals.
But why does this have to come at the expense of accuracy?
Why do they feel the need to blatantly condemn other professions such as
farming? Why let the truth get in the way of a good story?
This is what they say on the Website (http://www.gentlebarn.org/index.php) about this cow Karma: Karma was
rescued from a cruelty case where she had no food, water, or shelter, and
enormous stress. We were able to save her two sons as well, and she is an
excellent mom. Now their every need will be taken care of.
So a group of rural men and women who live and breathe cattle
watched this video expecting to have our hearts broken about this poor tiny
baby calf, starving cow and magical reunion. Instead we sat there in
disbelief, indignant that a cause as great as The Gentle Barn could blatantly
make up the story for their own purposes.
We put together a few of these points:
· The website claims she had no food/water
and was under incredible stress where she came from. She’s looking like she’s in fantastic
condition for a cow that hasn’t been fed or watered as well as feeding a large
calf. She looks to us like she’s had
ample food. Also Karma was rescued in
November 2008 and Governor Schwarzenegger declared a drought state of emergency
in February 2009. She was only removed
from the “cruelty case” the night before.
She’s obviously been well fed in a state that’s been drought
declared.
· If cows are under considerable stress,
they will not continue to produce milk.
Karma had plenty of milk. If she
didn’t she wouldn’t have had leaky udders and would have weaned her calf long
before this video was taken.
· It astounds me that people who take in
these animals can’t read the easiest signs about them. The narrator of the video claims that they had
no idea the cow had a calf. To anyone that has half a clue about cattle it
would have been obvious that she was lactating.
Even if her udder had recently been sucked out, it would have been
obvious by the shape and texture of her teats.
· Speaking of reading obvious signs, it
turns out 8mths after her rescue; the owners of The Gentle Barn went to lock
her up one evening to find a hoof protruding from her. Yes, Karma was calving and they had no idea
she was even pregnant, something which should have been very noticeable. Karma would have had to get in calf before
she was “rescued” (cattle have a nine month gestation period), something she
wouldn’t have done if starved, dehydrated and stressed. Karma would have found it quite hard to
sustain milk for Mr Rojas (older calf) and carry Surprise (new calf) without
extra care (which she wouldn’t have received as they did not know she was
pregnant).
· Our guess is judging by the size of the
calf shown that it was being weaned by the previous owner. Something that is done by all farmers for
good animal welfare. If the calf is not
separated from its mother by a certain time the mother will wean the calf
naturally by kicking it in the head every time it tries to suck. I would have thought people at The Gentle
Barn were going to have to separate the calf in the not too distant future to
stop this happening. By re-introducing
the calf to the mother it’s just drawn out the process. Under the clip, a
comment asks why the man didn’t carry the calf.
The Gentle Barn replies that the calf weighs around 300lbs (approx.
126kg) so is too heavy. A calf that size
and in that condition would be most capable to survive without its mother’s
milk. After further reading it turns out
that Mr Rojas was never weaned by the Gentle Barn, putting him at risk of
injury and putting undue physical strain on Karma. Also in several blogs written by The Gentle
Barn, they say Karma and her “tiny” baby Mr Rojas. The Mr Rojas in the rescue video is beyond tiny.
· Karma has just been moved to a strange
environment and put in with strange cattle.
She will be bellowing as much for familiarity as for her calf
· The video claims that Karma tries to break
down the pasture fence. She’s not in a pasture;
she’s in a pen with hard dirt ground and artificial shelter. From what we can see Karma and the other cow
don’t even have a bale of hay to graze on as is a cow’s natural behaviour. Looking at other animals, they are in the
same sort of environment. 160+ animals
on 6acres is quite intensive. I’m
wondering if they have any vet checks or at least someone well practiced in
dealing with animal health on board?
Probably not if they didn’t realise Karma was in calf. If that was a working farm and had animals at
that density there would no doubt be an uproar.
· The calf is obviously not halter
broken. You can’t just put a calf on a
lead and expect it to follow. You’re
better off pushing it than pulling it.
Another thing that I’m astounded by these people not doing. Pulling on that calf would have been
unbelievably stressful for it. I know
their hearts are in the right place, but honestly? Calves are no different to
foals or puppies when being taught to lead.
· The calf is in great condition. He has ample fat around his brisket or dewlap
(the fold of skin under its neck. If it
was starving, it would not be so full looking).
It’s not falling over because he’s weak.
He’s throwing himself down just like a reluctant toddler, simply because
he’s sick of being dragged around. Being
away from his mother for one day would not have caused such weakness. Also if
cattle collapse from weakness, their front legs buckle and they go nose
first. Not flip themselves on their
sides like in the video.
· If he was that weak, he would have been
easy enough to carry with two people, he would not have put up much of a fight.
· Why not back the trailer into the yards,
so they could let the calf walk out by itself and not go through the stress of
being dragged around?
· This wasn’t said on the video but I’m sure
a lot of people look at the end bit and say “oh look, the poor little baby is
crying because of what’s happened”.
Newsflash: cattle don’t cry with emotion. They can’t wipe their eyes out with their
hooves like we can with our fingers. So
their eye watering mechanism is really touchy.
Poor calf probably had heaps of dust it his eyes from throwing itself
down in the dirt so his eyes were watering to clean out.
· Another comment under the clip on YouTube
asks about dairy to which The Gentle Barn answers “have you tried soy”. No mention of the huge environmental and
health problems with soy. But according to any Animal Rights groups, dairy calves
are taken from their mothers from birth and slaughtered very young. To us, Karma doesn’t even look like a dairy
cow.
You’re
probably wondering what a beef farmer from North Queensland is doing writing
about a sanctuary in California. It’s
because this type of farming misinformation is so common these days that
someone has to stand up and say “hey, that’s not right”. Before the world thinks that whatever is
written by animal rights groups is gospel.
As I said
before, The Gentle Barn does some great work, but why portray something so
inaccurately? Is it because they simply don’t know any better (one would hope
not though, if they have so many animals in their care surely the above is
obvious) or is something far more sinister….. Like never let the truth get in
the way of story which will raise you money.
About an hour
after I wrote this, some further information about the Gentle Barn came to my
attention. Seems my gut instincts may be
right. This is an extract from one of
many comments (mostly negative) about the running of The Gentle Barn (you can
view them all here) : Further, while many of
the animals came from neglected and abused backgrounds, many others have not.
However, they use all of the animals in their campaigns to gain sympathy and
more donation dollars with "rescue" or "neglect" stories
that are simply untrue; deceiving the public further.
I also found a
photo of Karma and Mr Rojas after rescue:
To my mind
this is a different Karma to the one in the video, she seems in worse condition
in this photo than what she is in the video.
She was rescued in November 2008 the video not uploaded until April the
next year. So did they take this photo
when they first rescued her and take the video later, causing stress on mother
and calf for their own purposes? Or did
they take the video straight away and this photo later showing Karma in worse
condition for being at the Gentle Barn?
I find it
very disappointing that organisations that have the capacity to do so much good
find the need to “expand on the truth” to simply get the public’s heartstrings
going and wallets open.
Our endeavour is one of awareness, while many organisations are certainly genuine and worthy of our support, services and our money, there are some, even in Australia, that initially portray themselves to have sound moral ethics but upon closer inspection choose to manipulate the truth to serve their own purpose and often hidden agenda
