What are we doing to our animals

On Thursday I was waiting for my massage appointment and started reading an article in Newsweek about a system in science called "Evolution in Reverse." The basic idea is that scientist are starting to see a creation of a middle class animal emerging. Newsweek actually referred to them as "loser animals." The process is as such: Hunters are hunting for the biggest and strongest animals. The ones with the biggest horns or tallest height or what ever. In essence - hunters are taking out the best of the bunch. Disease usually takes out the worse of a bunch, this leave a middle class of animals to reproduce. They aren't the best and they surely aren't the worse but they are this middle class of individual. What I found interesting about this article was that the role man is playing in natural selection. Darwin's theory that those creatures with dominate traits will survive and those with disease won't. But if you throw into the mix the animal "human" then you get a whole other result.

This leads to another interesting perspective I heard on NPR this weekend. Temple Grandin is Autistic and has a doctorate in Animal Science (after getting a BS in psychology). She was discussing Animal care when it comes to stockyards. One of the things she talked about that we have gotten to a point that our desire for bigger animals or more milk producing animals is creating problems in animals. For example, as ranchers try to create fatter pigs, the result has been increased structure problems in pigs. They have leg and hoof problems. Arthritis is on the rise among pigs. For cows the push has been to have more milk being produced. The result has been a break down of muscles, hearts, and other major organs. The theory is that a cow only has a certain about of milk in them (let's say 300 gallons). In a normal course of life those 300 gallons will come at a rate that the cow's internal organs can handle it. However, ranchers have found a way to force those 300 gallons out faster, but the increased stress on the cows has created a break down in their internal organs as the stress of 300 gallons in 10 years instead of 15 has excelerated the bodies response.

Gradin talked a lot about treatment of animals and how to make slaughter more successful, which was interesting, but it didn't spike my interest quite like the previous. (For a good 15 minutes she talks about the effects of Autism so for all those autism junkies out there - it's a good listen too.)

This topic intrigues me on so many levels. Just like how I think it is important to seriously start looking at vertical farming, I think we need to seriously look at how we treat our animals. I am hopeful that we can correct some of these problems before we have to result of the resturaunt stylings of the Donner Party. (I being a larger chubby kind of guy - I would probably go first.)