Gordon Ramsay's F word.

[auditt]

Hi,
I chickened out when watching this week's F word, when it came to the slaughter of his two pigs.
B4 I switched off the slaughter man said that he would stun the pigs and then deal them humanly.
I was lead to believe that an animal can recover from a stun gun, where there is no recovery from the bolt gun.
If this is the case then why do they use the stun gun......Is the animal really dead before it is butchered?

Only a basic reply please....No graphic details!

Thanks in advance.............AudiTT..........xx.

[k@tie]

i have eaten meat all my life and could never understand people wanting to be vegetarian...however after watching the slaughter of the piggies i now know why people dont eat meat! i wont go into detail but it was obvious the pigs were in great distress and didnt appear to be dead when slaughtered..it was still alive when it was held up by its one leg..when watching i let out a big shout and cried lots :((

[skylight]

Hi auditt

They stun them so they dont feel their throat being cut.
Then they are hung up to let blood pump out for collection.This is made into Black Pudding and very nice it is too!! You can eat everything from a pig bar the sqeak.
Hope I've not put you off.... skylight

[Rabelais]

It induces an artificial epileptic fit in the animal, wherein the neural cells are discharged by the voltage. So the brain is not functioning, the animal is then suspended and it's throat is cut where upon death occurs rapidly due to blood loss. The process is painless and the animal suffer not one jot, while it may look like they struggle and jerk as though alive these are post mortum spasms. You can read more about porcine welfare here.
http://www.grandin.com/references/pig.welfare. during.transport.slaughter.html

[maggie01]

How can anyone say it is painless. The only one who knows this is the pig and it can't tell you. I am only glad I did not watch it. It's barbaric.

[auditt]

Thanx for the replies.....Reading the article that 'Rabelais' mentioned..It does state that the animal will recover from the stun gun, if it is not bled quick enough!
And it also states that if correct practice is followed the animal does/will suffer.
Hang on a minute how can that be humane........So why is the bolt gun not used instead, where there is no chance of the animal recovering?
When a vet comes to put a horse down or another large animal on a farm he will either give a lethal injection,depending on the destination of the dead animal, or use the bolt gun.....................Why is this not done at the slaughter house, it must be just as quick?
Once again, the question of animal welfare during slaughter has been raised........And once again, all the fingers point to the process not being humane!!!!!!!

An answer from a vet or someone who works in a slaughter house would be the best.

And further replies please..But again no graphic details.


Thanks.....................AudiTT.

[Monster-S]

People are too soft these days.

[skylight]

Hi Auditt The slaughter in an abattoir is in two parts no matter what annimal. First they have to be stunned either by an electrical charge or by captive bolt. This is then followed by the throat being cut which bleeds the animal to death while it is still insensible. Killing the animal outright means that it wont bleed properly after death ,therefore the meat will not keep. skylight

[Noweia]

When an animal is killed in an abattoir, it is first stunned, either by captive bolt or by an electrical stun gun. This knocks the animal out - it's unconscious so it doesn't feel anything.

Animals can recover from a stun gun, and also from a captive bolt, especially if it is the type that doesn't penetrate the skull, so regulations require that animals must be bled out rapidly after being stunned.

Quite often there will be muscular contractions after the animal is dead - as Rabelais says, these are post mortem spasms, and unless you are expecting them, it can be quite distressing as it appears that the animal is alive when in reality it isn't. There can also be spasms after the animal is stunned due to abnormal brain activity - again, this isn't the animal consciously struggling.

There are many reasons that chemicals aren't used in slaughterhouses:
- the drug remains in the body after the animal dies and contaminates the carcass, making it dangerous to eat. Doses used to kill a large animal are also lethal in humans!
- It would take too long to find a vein and inject every animal
- The cost of the drug would also make it too expensive
- There is still a risk of using the incorrect dose that won't kill the animal, and the drug causes pain at the injection site.

The methods used aren't 100% fallible, and with the huge numbers of animals going through the abattoirs every day some animals aren't stunned properly. However it is the priority of everyone working in these places that all animals are treated humanely. Here in the UK we have some of the toughest Animal Health and Welfare regulations in the world.

You can view the regulations here:

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si1995/Uksi_19950731 _en_1.htm

And the DEFRA website has more information:

[Noweia]

...

http://www.defra.gov.uk/

I hope this answers your questions!

[commoner]

I am an old guy who can remember helping my grandfather (the local "pigkiller") and his six sons kill pigs in our "backyard"..they were held down by the lads on a huge wooden "plonk" as we called it and their throats cut the blood caught in buckets..........buckets of scalding hot water was then thrown over and the bristles scraped off. Huge sides of bacon and hams were hung up in grandmas living room ready to be devoured by his familly of twelve kids and their offspring including me............Being brought up like this leaves me with no feelings for food animals, though strangely I would defend the rights of wild animals and pets to the last..........

[clair3934]

Often the pigs are stunned on a large scale say 50 pigs at a time and then hung and bleed, by the time the last pig to be stunned is hung up to be bleed it is often comeing round from the stun and quite often the pigs arn't stunned for long enough so never lose consiousness it is a big walfare issue, bolt gun's arn't used because people do buy pigs heads and they don't want to see a whole in the middle of it. also don't know if you noticed but they were culled together in the same room, a rule of thumb used in the animal care world is that if an animal has to be disposed of then you never do it infront of another animal as this causes stress.
I myself don't eat meat and havn't done for a very long time not because I disagree with killing animals because at the end of the day they are breed to be eaten but because I don't like the taste or smell of it.
I must say though it is a shame that more can't be done to make the slaughter a little easyer on the poor little blighters.