Starving Livestock

[coppertop]

I hope the rest of you on this site are
not dealing with this situation in your
community. A neighbour has approxmiately
60 cows, 1/3 of them with calves on
them. He turned them into an old pasture
in October and that is where they are
still. Prior to Christmas the
temperatures dropped to -42 here, they
had no feed, no shelter as the entire
quarter section has no trees. The ALERT
line was called, as were the RCMP.
The owner takes one large bale of hay to
these cattle every three or four days,
or he takes a few square bales and
tosses them out on the ground. Of course
only a few of the cows eat, the rest are
shoved away. The cows have eaten the
branches of all the trees along the
ditches adjacent to the property.
Yesterday one cow was down, and this
morning she is deader than a doornail
with coyotes all around her.
This property has 14 residences within
half a mile all but two are acreages, so
what image are they getting of the
cattle industry ?
The ALERT line was called again today,
contact numbers were left but nobody has
returned the call.
The ALERT line is supposed to be
directly connected to the SPCA livestock
inspectors, and either they don't care
or are so busy dealing with other cases
like this they don't have the time to
respond. The local RCMP will be
contacted again tomorrow.
The owner should be horse whipped and
banned from ever owning even so much as
a cat. Every one of us who has animals
in our care knows the challenges we are
dealing with in a winter like this one.
Regardless of the price, or whatever
hardship any particular farmer has,
there is no excuse for starving animals.

[Happytrails]

I hope you have some luck getting the RC's and maybe brand inspectors involved. In theory there is still a livestock impound location in every area. Starving a profit from a cow never works. Thanks for making people aware.

[coppertop]

I should have clarified, this neighbour
owns nearly 300 cows, only 60 of them are
in this area, God only knows what is
happening to the rest of them.

[per]

How about driving in to his place and have a coffee with him. Find out what the trouble is. There might be some underlying issues that could at least offer some insight. I'm pretty sure I would get company and help if something went awry here.

[coppertop]

Driving to his place for coffee is out
of the question. The fellow has a major
drinking problem he has no concern for
the livestock, and before Christmas was
bragging at the local auction market
that people who were paying huge amounts
for hay were crazy, he was going to
winter his cattle on pasture and there
was no need to haul feed in for them.
Anyone who knows their stock are out in
-40 weather with no feed is beyond
reasoning with. If the guy cannot afford
feed, he can haul the cattle to market
and sell them, because if they are
seized by the SPCA that is exactly what
will happen and he may end up banned
from owning livestock.
I know the situation well, have lived
across from it for years and watched
numerous times when cattle and horses
were allowed to get skinnier than rails.
I have seen cows down trying to calve
for hours, and called every relative the
guy has until somebody tracked him down.
He and other heartless @@##$$ like him
give our industry a bad name and should
not be a part of it.

[kato]

Nowadays even the good operators are struggling to stay in business. I bet this guy isn't going to be a cattle owner for much longer anyway. Since he's not feeding them, that's a pretty good indication that the money has run out. He's just too stubborn to admit it.

I predict that next winter will not bring these problems again, because he will be done. We had a guy in our area who was the same, only on a smaller scale. He was eventually shut down, and his cattle were seized. He blamed all his problems on everyone but himself. It took hitting bottom to open up his eyes, but they did get opened.

[coppertop]

Yesterday at the local feed store I
heard comments about this same fellow
overgrazing horse pasture last summer to
the point that the horses had grazed to
the dirt.
It will be a relief when he is out of
the business. Right now there are packs
of coyotes chewing on a dead animal less
than 200 yds from an acreage not owned
by this guy. Neighbourhood dogs are
hanging around the carcass so it is just
a matter of time until we have dogs
running in packs, and every livestock
producer will pay dearly if that
happens. Not to mention the fact that
there are numerous families will young
kids living close to this operation, and
with nice weather kids are out skiing
and tobogganing, not ideal to mix coyote
packs and kids in my mind.

[mcfarms]

Thank you for caring about these animals. I do think though you have done all you can under the current rules. I would make sure that you document you calls and contacts and if you don't get reasonable service from the Alert line or the RCMP maybe a call to your MLA or a discussion with AFAC may get some results. I suspect that you are right this is a problem that may be happening all over the province this winter.

[burnt]

Well coppertop, it must sure be tough to have to stand by and watch this without being able to do more than you have. It is just brutal to have to watch someone else screw up so royally. I would agree - you have done what you can, but I'm sure that those words must feel about as empty as those cows stomachs.

[coppertop]

I know that the ALERT line got four
phone calls yesterday, and today, wonder
of wonders the family moved the cows up
to the farm headquarters. All it took to
move that bunch was a pickup with a few
forkfulls of hay. They had a quad and
someone in an SUV following them, one
cow was trying to climb over the
tailgate of the truck to the hay ! They
had a two mile drive to get them to the
homeplace. I will be following up with
ALERT to make sure someone is keeping an
eye out for the welfare of those
critters. I do not enjoy doing this, I
would much rather mind my own business,
but this is my industry too, and one bad
apple makes all of us look bad in the
eyes of urban types.
I would feel terribly sorry for the
owner if he was physically unable to
look after stock or if he had fallen on
hard times etc., but when money for
whiskey is more important than feed for
animals it gets my Irish up !!!

[smcgrath76]

This one hits close to home as we just
brought one bunch home off of grass on
Saturday (onto swaths). We had young
cows that gained 1/2 a BCS although we
did provide some bedding and were
supplementing a bit of barley. That
said, there was and still is a lot of
grass left on the quarter. Cows are
still out grazing grass and gaining
weight. There has to be grass/forage,
and shelter available. It can be done,
but it takes management. We even feed
test our grass so we know what we are
doing and what to expect, and we sure
wouldn't try it with calves still on the
cow.
Just turning cows loose to fend for
themselves is animal cruelty and has
absolutely no place anywhere, let alone
in this industry. It is also false
economy. A dead cow costs less to feed
than a fat one, but she produces
accordingly.
I suspect like most things there is more
to the story, but the creation of the
problem usually stems from something
that will lead to more problems in the
future.

[coppertop]

A followup with the SPCA this morning
was interesting. They were never
notified that messages had been left on
the ALERT line !
The SPCA will send an inspector out to
the property, make sure the livestock
owner knows he is under observation and
his livestock must be cared for.
In some areas I am sure that livestock
can forage but this area has over a foot
of snow on the ground, no trees on the
quarter for shelter, limited supply of
water running from a hose from a spring,
and no mineral in site. As I said in a
previous post I do not relish being
involved in this, but if one less animal
suffers then I am more than willing to
take any 'heat' that may come my way.