Farmers and Shearers Hit Gentle Sheep in the Face and Kicked Them
As you can see in this groundbreaking video footage, workers in Scotland violently punched these gentle animals in the face, slammed their heads into the floor, beat and kicked them, and threw them off the shearing trailers. When they panicked – as prey animals, who are terrified of being pinned down, do – the shearers stamped, stood, and knelt on their necks and abdomens.
Fast, Rough Shearing Left Many Sheep Bleeding
Shearers are paid by volume, not by the hour, which encourages fast, violent handling that leads to severe gashes. The eyewitness never saw workers provide any pain relief before stitching up their gaping, bloody wounds with a needle and thread or give any veterinary care to the sheep who had bloody hooves or mastitis – a painful infection of the udder. In the video, you can see one sheep suffering from mastitis who couldn’t stand up. A worker said that she was going to be shot.
Sheep Went Limp During Shearing and Died
Some sheep went limp during shearing. Workers dragged them off the trailers and left them to die, and the eyewitness saw one of them die shortly after shearing. On one farm, a farmer dragged a sheep, who appeared to be dying, by the leg, allowing her head to bounce along the hard rocky soil for several metres. Another shearer dangled a dying sheep off a shearing platform and propped her against a railing, where she convulsed and died shortly afterward.
And it’s not any better for sheep in England or anywhere else.
See for yourself:
Everywhere that eyewitnesses from PETA Asia and its affiliates go, they see the same disturbing behaviour. PETA Asia has released nine exposés of 96 sheep operations on four continents, including in Australia, North America, and South America, where sheep were beaten, kicked, mutilated, and jabbed in the face with sharp metal clippers and lambs were even skinned alive.
It’s simple: The production of all wool – no matter where it originated or what “ethical” or “responsibly sourced” claims are made on its label – spells extreme suffering and death for millions of gentle sheep and lambs.
