How do farmers reconcile themselves to the volumes of animals they send to slaughter over the course of their lifetimes?

[Empanadas]

Hi, this is something I’ve always wondered. However, I was watching that Netflix series about Prince Charles and the Duchy of Cornwall and there was a farmer showing a whole barn of cattle he has obviously reared from birth, but quite blithely saying, “oh they'll all be off next week.”

AIBU to think being a cattle / sheep / chicken farmer takes a certain type of person and to wonder how they deal with their conscience in this depressing business?

Yes, the unpalatable truth is that the availability of a fairly cheap supermarket chicken is a godsend for many families with young DC who are living below the poverty line.

You have to eat a lot of a vegan foods (which are not energy dense) to get sufficient energy from it. But children do not generally eat huge volumes of food, so getting enough calories and protein in to them is a challenge.

Also a child deriving protein from pulses, has to have the right combination of plant based foods, whereas a child who only eats chicken will get all the correct amino acids from one good source.

So the ethical dilemma is , is it morally and ethically right for those of us with the financial means to eat a broad selection of farm fresh veg with a little locally sourced organic meat thrown in, to deny a child whose family lives on the poverty line, the nutritional benefits of a reasonably priced supermarket chicken?

@Empanadas

“Life in the wild can be much more precarious than you imagine.”

Yes this is a valid point, I’d still rather have few cows for grazing / dairy purposes only. If animals are only being bred for slaughter, it would be better if this didn’t happen at all. That’s my take in it, but of course others will disagree and justify it however they need to.

So what would you like like the farmers to do with the calves that are born that their mothers can produce milk?

I suggest your stop because your are really showing your ignorance.

I am not telling anyone to be vegan. I would NEVER do that. My own children are not vegan.

For the final time, the thread is not about veganism! It wax not even about dairy farming. It was a question - “How do farmers reconcile themselves to animals they have reared being sent for slaughter.”

The thread is not about soy, avocados, air miles, global warming, insects, bugs, rainforests and the entire planet! It is not about veganism and I have repeatedly acknowledged I have no inside knowledge of cattle farming and I certainly do not claim to be an avocado-eating eco warrior either. It was a specific question to farmers.

“So what would you like like the farmers to do with the calves that are born that their mothers can produce milk? “

What do you mean “do with?”

Harvest mice are super cute as well.

I absolutely agree that animal welfare standards are important. For the animals raised for meat and those who are destroyed as part of raising other types of food.

All food raising destroys animals, humans however need to eat food. It is therefore about balancing needs.

Reasonable housing, access to outdoor and vet care for farmed animals.

Not taking an entire water supply for avocados causing local drought conditions.

Leaving wide strips around arable fields, not strimming and spraying verges.

Farmers send their animals to slaughter because that was the purpose of raising them. It provides nutrition for a country that both wants and needs it.

You don't want or need it OP which is fine but others do.

( The diary industry produces a lot of calves as a by product. What are you thinking should happen to the calves, particularly the male ones?

Damm posted too soon, I think the diary industry is calf free since we stopped using vellum.

@Empanadas I noticed in quoting me you missed out the bit about how livestock and arable farming are importantly interlinked when it comes to optimum soil health.

How many calves does a female cow produce though - eg in a year?

Is there really no way of managing a scalable dairy operation that doesn’t involve selling off or slaughtering the male calves?

I don’t need all the “you are thick” responses. It’s a genuine question.

Empanadas But you don’t want animals to be killed, which is veganism…. And the discussion has to be about “soy, avocados, air miles” because currently that is the veganism on offer.

We have answered how we as farmers feel about keeping and killing animals. I don’t really see what you plan on doing to effect change? I mean the issue is bigger than all of us but I don’t see what your points are, you know so little about farming or production or retail - basically the supply chain - so are putting random questions to farmers because you once saw a cow in London? You don’t seem interested in our responses at all?

I mean you’ve asked about sterilising cows and comparing the Indian and UK climates so I’m at a loss

Our friend who is a farmer is very practical about it all. His sheep are well loved but they are known only as a number, same as the chickens that he raises. It helps not to get attached to them before they go off to be slaughtered.

Millions of people worldwide in all types of circumstances never eat meat at all and never did

Good for them.

“@Empanadas I noticed in quoting me you missed out the bit about how livestock and arable farming are importantly interlinked when it comes to optimum soil health.”

Er ok. Sorry that didn’t leap out as a major benefit of mass slaughter practises. But point taken.

Q: How many calves does a female cow produce though - eg in a year?
A: one a year. The boys aren’t really needed - they might be kept on mother’s who’ve lost a calf or kept for beef, or sold on for slaughter at a young age. Currently there’s no way for a cow to produce milk without having been in calf - I think they need to be in calf each year to keep producing milk but we don’t specialise in dairy so will leave to a dairy farmer to answer

Empanadas The point about soil health is the opposite - it’s impossible to do arable farming without animal produce (like gardens with manure). Unless you do non organic farming… but even then you need the compost. Yes that is a key benefit of animal farming and needed to support arable farming.

@Mytiredeyeshaveseenenough

I eat meat and I'd rather pay more for an animal that's been cared for.

Question. If the world went vegan, what exactly happens to the existing livestock? Shot and incinerated because they no longer have any economic use and I'd guess that dairy cows especially would be quite expensive for zoos because of the milking compared to their customer attracting possibilities.

I'd also hazard a guess that a hell of a lot of land used for grazing isn't suitable for conversion to arable farming.

God help us all if anyone finds out that vegetables have any form of sentience.

We import most of our meat and fish to the UK so not sure this argument works very well. (I’m not vegan btw)

@Empanadas It’s incredibly important, it shows your lack of understanding of agriculture. Without farming in a sustainable ways such as using livestock to restore soil fertility the U.K. has maybe at best 50 harvests left.

@Empanadas

Do people genuinely not think the world would be a better place without beef farming? Even if we could eradicate that it would be a start.

It’s what climate scientists are telling us - people don’t want to hear it

@Spidey66 I know a vegan farmer. It's unlikely they'd be a livestock farmer, but absolutely everything that vegans eat is grown by a farmer. It's why I think it's ridiculous we are so vilified.

WHY do you superiorly assume that they need to reconcile anything?

You don't seem too bothered about using a device which battery is likely to burn or hurt the poor sod who will deal with it once you've dump it.

Chatting away on MN is hardly a necessity, is it.

Google it, there's no lack of sources highlighting the problem
Here's one

@Bitofachinwag

I understand that the idea of killing and eating animals seems wrong to some people. But If you are a vegan and you believe farm animals are treated badly, do you know for certain that the humans involved in making your vegan food have been treated well and paid fairly?

Classic whataboutery! Factory life isn’t fun for most people whether they are making vegan sausages or meat ones

I do think @Empanadas highlights an important issue though - that there are other people who are as poorly educated and overly emotive as her, who are shaping agricultural policy around the world.

What will happen, granted not in our lifetime, is that soil fertility will decline and we will ultimately end up extinct, because we all need to eat. And it will be the pandering to the people who come up with mindlessly stupid phrases like "death on the hillsides" because we can't be seen to be offending those poorly educated individuals.

@AlternativePerspective

Well, how do these sanctimonious vegans reconcile the fact that they eat so much processed crap that they’re killing the environment? That they are actively campaigning for the extinction of various species of animals, and that their diet is so unhealthy that they need supplements to balance it out?

Oh, and is a cabbage only ok to eat because it’s not breathing?even though it’s alive?

That’s a silly argument - meat eaters are some of the unhealthiest on the planet. (Not vegan btw)

They do not see animal as comparable with humans. They regard them as a natural source of food for humans. There's nothing wrong with that.

@HJ91

There is no such thing as ‘humane’ slaughter. It’s never humane to slaughter a living sentiment being that doesn’t want to die. Language is important too. Once somebody described ‘meat’ as ‘flesh’ and ‘corpse’ to me, which is of course what it is, it definitely started that seed of doubt. On the plus side, I think people are becoming more mindful of where there food comes from and veganism/vegetarianism is definitely increasing for a variety of reasons, one of which is better communication.

OP - I do think that the best way to have these discussions is to talk to those closest to you, or even better, wait until you’re asked about why you’re vegetarian/vegan. This is both how I became vegan (friends and family turned vegan, and I asked why) and why others close to me have now started to question their meat consumption. As this thread shows, there will always be a reaction when such a huge aspect of most people’s lives is challenged in such a broad stroke (and maybe not the best audience here)! What we eat and what we avoid eating seems to form a huge part of personal identity, and I for one find it’s better to talk to those who are open to changing their eating habits already. I don’t think shaming meat eaters and/or farmers will change their resolve.

And one of my exes described cheese as 'mouldy disgusting mammary secretions' to me. As I was breastfeeding our child.

That also sowed a seed of doubt in me. One that grew into the realisation that he was revolted by female bodies, whether human or not.

There's a very noticeable thread of misogyny running through vegan discourse at times.

I posted because I watched a documentary about Prince Charles. I’ve no interest in the royals as a file, but I wanted to see what he does. I was not aware that he owns so much land because he inherited the “Duchy of Cornwall.” It’s quite interesting to hear him actually speak informally. It all seems like a remnant if the feudal system tbh, because people who live on his estates have to pay some kind of levy.

Anyway, it was all about how William is obviously due to inherit all this, No mention of inheritance tax (?), but there you go. Who knows? To this end, William visited a farm and he was being shown around by a farmer and it was all very jovial - “What a marvellous job we are doing here, etc etc.” There was a barn rammed with black cows. William asked what was happening with these cows. The farmer said,”Oh they’re off next week.” It was as if he was talking about posting a parcel. William asked if he ever felt any pang of sadness about this kind of thing, and the farmer just made a joke of it.

It just struck me that not many people - vegan, vegetarian or meat eater - would be able to take that kind of attitude and it got me thinking. Hence the thread.