Lamb, Eaten

A lot of lambs are slaughtered because a lot of people want to eat lamb. Lambs for eating are killed early in life, and so they do not experience a full life.

Humans’ eating of lamb, as well as occurring for ‘ordinary reasons’, also happens from being a custom in some religions. An association exists between festivity and eating lamb.

It is not only humans who eat lamb. We know that the dog is a predator of sheep, that dogs out of control can cause sheep stress, harm or even death. But there is another dimension in relation to dogs and sheep. This is that among food which providers offer for dogs is lamb - delivered in various configurations.

Lambs to be eaten do not have much of life, or much of a life. They are being deprived of a large portion of life because of humans’ and dogs’ desire to eat them.

In relation to lambs, Eastertide is a time of contrast and somewhat grim irony. Traditionally, lamb is eaten then. Out in fields, meanwhile, are many lambs, enjoying their young lives (and having feeding and care from their mothers whom they are with).

Can it possibly be right that lots of lambs should lose life, and so soon in the life cycle, for purpose to be food?

It is a gladsome thing that some lambs do have a full life, in that they are not slaughtered in infancy. It is additionally gladsome if, as well as not having been slaughtered in infancy, lambs have not been made to suffer in other ways during their infancy. 

Lambs who are not slaughtered when young, are: those lambs which humans keep to give the lambs adulthood and entirety; those lambs which are kept to grow up to be adult sheep and to breed lambs; those lambs which humans keep to increase the number of sheep which they have. 

Sadly, for a quantity of lambs, they neither get to experience the full span of life, nor do they have much good or joyous existence as lambs.   

Lambs’ Lives

A stereotypical image of lambs is of them gambolling happily in a field, with their mothers close by, looking after them and seeing that they are fed. This is lambs’ existence. But, for some the experience is short, or very short. This is because in the endeavour of sheep farming, ovines are seen as for use. 

If mothers are to give their milk for dairy, their lambs can be quickly removed from them, and thus the lambs will be without their mother’s presence and care and will be fed from a bottle not their mother’s teat. To be meat which is termed ‘lamb’ a lamb will require to be slaughtered young (at some time between age of 10 weeks and 12 months - but most usually when around 6 months old). Lambskin - lamb leather - can arrive from being a lamb meat industry by-product or from slaughter of a lamb directly to be lambskin. The process of ‘getting to be meat’ can have two elements. A lamb is got to a stage but is not yet of best condition and weight to be ready to be meat to eat. It will then be moved from its existing circumstance to another, for bringing it to best state for being meat for the table. In the instance, the lamb will be sold, after first stage of the process, as a store lamb. It will have to endure transportation and likely too the stress of a sheep sale. It should be noted also that there can be ‘ewes with lambs at foot’ (ewes with lambs) sold at sheep sales.

It is a gladsome thing that some lambs do have a full life, in that they are not slaughtered in infancy. It is additionally gladsome if, as well as not having been slaughtered in infancy, lambs have not been made to suffer in other ways during their infancy. 

Lambs who are not slaughtered when young, are: those lambs which humans keep to give the lambs adulthood and entirety; those lambs which are kept to grow up to be adult sheep and to breed lambs; those lambs which humans keep to increase the number of sheep which they have. 

Sadly, for a quantity of lambs, they neither get to experience the full span of life, nor do they have much good or joyous existence as lambs.   

Deliberate Cruelty

Humans’ cruelty towards sheep can be unwitting or deliberate. Here, deliberate cruelty will be considered.

Deliberate cruelty represents humans knowing that their action or absence of action will bring suffering to sheep but doing it nonetheless. Despite awareness that sheep are live creatures and who feel - are sentient - the humans render the cruelty.   

Categories of deliberate cruelty range widely. 

There are those types which represent wrong, unkind, harmful, or else inadequate and insufficient, treatment of sheep during day-to-day sheep farming process and procedures. 

There are the types which represent putting, or leaving, sheep in such contexts as are recognised to be liable to render harm to the sheep, such as a war zone or an area of a natural disaster of some kind. Recent examples are Gaza and an area of Iceland. In Iceland, over 200 sheep had been ‘left to their fate by farmers after a volcanic eruption near the evacuated town of Grindavik (‘Rescuers in daring bid to save sheep trapped by Iceland volcano’, The Guardian, 16th January, 2024). All the sheep were rescued to safety ‘following two days without water and feed’ (Iceland Review website, 18th January 2024). 

Here is another type. It is portrayed in that dog owner who knows fully that dogs are natural predators of sheep, who completely appreciates that they should train their dogs to behave well, who is entirely aware that they need to constrain their dogs from going near sheep and worrying them, but who, nonetheless, lets their dogs worry sheep. 

Live exports of sheep is an activity type which has known potential - strong likelihood - to deliver circumstances of deliberate cruelty to sheep. Journeys are often long, space can be overcrowded, temperatures can be high. Recently, due to tensions in the Red Sea, M V Bahijah, a ship from Australia bound for Israel carrying around 14,000 sheep turned back, arriving in a summer heatwave and needing to wait off the coast of Australia before eventual disembarkation at port. The sheep were on the vessel for five and a half weeks in total (WAtoday, 13th February 2024).

A very direct type of deliberate cruelty to a sheep occurred in the UK in December of last year. At a village in Suffolk, ‘the sheep was killed by a club hammer and taken away with the hammer left on the footpath.’ (East Anglian Daily Times, 18th December 2023).  

Why does deliberate cruelty to sheep by a person or people group ever happen? Sheep are gentle, defenceless and non-aggressive creatures. They should only have the best and kindest of treatment. 

Unwitting Cruelty

Cruelty to sheep can be unwitting, in that the cruelty results from absence of questioning, comes from closed-mindedness, stems from ignorance. Or cruelty can be deliberate. Here, unwitting cruelty will be looked at.

Sheep farmers and their associates in the sheep farming industry, people who come into contact with sheep, the general populace – they all need to be cognisant of what constitutes cruelty towards sheep and to act towards sheep in accordance with that knowledge.

Unwitting cruelty to sheep derives from these among others:

seeing sheep as of no importance or value; 

regarding sheep as not worth treating well; 

perceiving sheep as items for humans’ use, and purpose (economic, usually); 

not realising or recognising that sheep are sentient, that they have feelings of pain, fear, stress etc;

staying with accepted practices in regards to sheep and not questioning those practices;

not keeping up-to-date on what represents cruelty towards sheep;

not checking sheep, and their needs, adequately and frequently enough;

failing to appreciate that sheep are prey animals (and so not ensuring that predators are constrained and are kept well away from sheep).

Examples of unwitting maltreatment of sheep are:

not giving them sufficient or appropriate care, sustenance and facilities, eg food and nutrition, fresh drinking water, a place of shelter, healthcare;

failing to take into account weather and climate conditions and outcomes; 

handling that is causing pain, harm, stress, fear;

putting them in environments, contexts, and circumstances that are ‘against their nature’ and preference.

Interesting to consider is the documentary film The Shepherds of Berneray (1981), made in 1978-79 by ethnographic filmmakers Jack Shea and Allen Moore from Harvard University. In it are displayed instances of what now would be seen as cruelty - sheep being hit, roped to each other via their horns, held by their horns, thrown from a boat to swim ashore, dropped into dip - sometimes upside down. Those who were doing these things to sheep in the film seem unwitting that they are treating the sheep cruelly. It could be that the humans did know that their treatment of the sheep was cruel; there is no indication that they did. 

Cruelty is cruelty, whether unwitting or deliberate. 

Entrenched Attitudes

In the activity of the sheep farming industry are displayed ‘we have always done it this way’ embedded attitudes. Change is necessary and overdue. 

Sheep farmers, as people working with living creatures requiring attention daily, have routines. The various elements comprising the ‘sheep farming year’ also have their place. And the year’s seasons impose what is to be done and how. So, there is both context and cause for the existence of an accepted approach in the activity of sheep farming. Additionally, farming of sheep is an endeavour usually happening in rural, quite remote, even isolated, places. Therefore, sheep farmers’ contact with a variety of people and viewpoints may not be huge. The general scene is provided for engendering attitudes in common to exist, and for leading to these to remain unaltered. 

The thought and manner of the sheep farming industry can lead to sheep being regarded as humans’ property and as items for humans’ use.

The attitude manifests outdated-ness. It is out of sync with latest, modern-world, thinking on animals and their welfare. That sheep are sentient is now recognised. Therefore, to ignore the recognition that sheep can feel, to treat them as if they are unfeeling objects, is unacceptable. For example, handling of sheep, in every situation, must be gentle, caring, considerate, respectful. 

On the part of sheep farmers and all those in the sheep industry, a change of thinking about sheep is required. Towards the required change, seeing sheep fundamentally differently is needed, then as an outcome of this, change and improvement of procedures is demanded.

Let us consider, more, and across the board, what is likely to be contributing to the formulation and maintenance of entrenched attitudes, and what needs to change.

Considering animal welfare laws, Gary Francione opines
‘… the law almost always defers to industry to set the standard of “humane” care. This deference is based on the assumption that those who produce animal products - from the breeders to the farmers to the slaughterhouse operators - are rational actors who will not impose more harm on animals than is required to produce the particular product, just as the rational owner of a car would not take a hammer to their car to dent it for no reason. We assume that whatever level of protection for animal interests that producers are providing is the level that is necessary to use animals for that purpose. The result is that the level of protection for animal interests is, with rare exceptions, set by the industry and is linked to what is required to exploit animals in an economically efficient way. And that allows for a standard of treatment that, if applied to humans, would clearly constitute torture.’
(Why Veganism Matters: The Moral Value of Animals, 2020, pp 31-32)

Sheep farmers and their associates such as auctioneers and their personnel, slaughter houses and their operatives, shearers, are working to cater to customers, humans. They form one sector of society in society as a whole. So, all humans need to change what they are demanding from sheep farmers and those others in the sheep farming industry. Moral philosopher Peter Singer, saying that habit ‘is the final barrier that the Animal Liberation movement faces’, continues thus:
‘Habits not only of diet but also of thought and language must be challenged and altered. Habits of thought lead us to brush aside descriptions of cruelty to animals as emotional, for “animal lovers only”; or if not that, then anyway the problem is so trivial in comparison to the problems of human beings that no sensible person could give it time and attention. This too is a prejudice…’. (Animal Liberation: Preface to the 1995 Edition)

Roanne Van Voorst considers ‘How can we live and eat in a way that does not exploit or wipe out other species?’. She says, ‘This thought experiment is difficult not only because it could mean we have to critically rethink our entire economic system but above all because it forces us to look at ourselves in a different way; to look at what a human is, and what a nonhuman animal is, and what animal rights could look like as a result, and how these differ from human rights, and the meaning of all these laws in relation to one another in an age in which humans have long since stopped behaving humanely.’ (Once Upon a Time We Ate Animals: The Future of Food, 2021), p 213. 

It can be seen that is not just sheep farmers and the entire sheep farming industry who need to review their attitudes to sheep. All of us need to open our minds and lose traditional perspectives that are inappropriate and causing sheep harm and suffering.

At The End

The end of life of so very many sheep is not natural, but human-produced. As example, in 2019 the number of sheep in the world ‘killed for meat’ was 602,319,130. (Data of FAOSTAT of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations given by Wikipedia in its ‘Animal slaughter’ article). Sourcing Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) information, the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board slaughtering figures for the year to November 2023 in the UK are Ewes and rams 1,520,018 and Other sheep and lambs 11,157,372. 

Regulation of livestock slaughterhouses exists. The Wikipedia article ‘Slaughterhouse’, discussing ‘International variations’, says ‘The standards and regulations governing slaughterhouses vary considerably around the world.’ Compassion in World Farming (CIWF), speaking on Humane Slaughter, states ‘Every year over 2 million animals are exported live out of the EU’, saying that ‘They are sent to countries where they receive no legal protection at the time of slaughter’. And CIWF continues, ‘It has become apparent that huge numbers of animals in the EU - roughly 18% of all sheep, and 27% of all goats - are not killed in official slaughter houses. This means that their slaughter goes entirely unregulated, and much of this is likely to be inhumane.’ In England are the ‘Welfare of Animals at the Time of Killing (England) Regulations 2015’. The executive arrangements for approving and monitoring slaughterhouses are complex in the UK; in England responsibility rests with the Food Standards Agency (FSA). The RSPCA welfare standards Sheep (August 2023) give detailed guidance on slaughter/killing of sheep, ‘to ensure livestock are not caused unnecessary distress or discomfort’.

Slaughterhouses need not only regulation but for regulations to be enforced and adhered to. A particular difficulty is that the process of the slaughterhouse is rarely visible to humans others than the participants - operatives and those with duty to monitor and inspect proceedings. Their attitudes and ethics can condition the calibre of outcome.

Psychologist Melanie Joy portrays that desensitization can occur in a someone whose work is to kill animals. 

She says, 
‘… it’s easy to assume that the people whose job it is to kill animals are sadistic or otherwise psychologically disturbed. Yet while psychological disturbance and even sadism may result from prolonged exposure to violence, they do not necessarily cause individuals to seek out a career in killing. In any violent ideology, those in the business of killing may not be jaded when they start out, but they eventually grow accustomed to violence that once disturbed them. Such acclimation reflects the defence mechanism routinization – routinely performing an action until one becomes desensitized, or numbed, to it.’ (Why Do We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows, 2020)   

It represents a difficult proposition for anyone from ‘outside’ to see what goes on in a slaughterhouse, and more so to shine light on it. From those who have ventured inside can come disturbing reports. 

The organisation Animal Equality, reporting on its investigations, says ‘Slaughterhouses are some of the cruellest places in the world, where every year, billions of farmed animals are subject to unimaginable suffering. These facilities are also some of the most secretive. The animal agriculture industry tries desperately to hide what happens behind their closed doors. However, over the years, Animal Equality has gathered extensive undercover footage which allows us to expose the cruel reality of slaughterhouses to the public.’ 

Among the Animal Equality investigations have been two of 2019. One was ‘an investigation into Mexico’s unregulated, ‘underground’ slaughterhouses, bringing to light the cruel treatment and slaughter of lambs and sheep. The other into a slaughterhouse in North Wales in the UK, Animal Equality describes as follows. ‘The investigation uncovered horrifying scenes of sheep getting painfully trapped in machinery and being beheaded in front of each other. Much of this suffering took place with an official Food Standards Agency inspector present.’ 
(‘Our Investigations Into Slaughterhouses’). 

Another organisation, Animal Aid, ‘has filmed in sixteen British slaughterhouses, finding evidence of lawbreaking in most of them.’ Among findings were: ‘sheep being dragged by their heads, forcibly thrown into the stun room, and picked up by their fleeces and ears’; ‘sheep being decapitated whilst still alive’; ‘sheep being smashed headfirst into pallets, a worker bouncing up and down on the neck of a sheep, and slaughterers hacking away at the throats of conscious sheep with a blunt knife’; fearful sheep… running in circles to evade being stunned’; ‘sheep being handled roughly, with one being thrown over a gate and another falling to the ground after being roughly pushed.’; cutting the throat of a sheep while fully conscious, and a stun-man picking up a sheep by her fleece and neck and hurling her down the slaughter conveyor line …. Another worker grabbed sheep by their throats or fleeces and threw them backwards into the conveyor, often with an audible crash’. 
(‘Humane slaughter in British abattoirs a sham’) 

As Joaquin Phoenix, narrator in the documentary film Earthlings (2005), says in that film ‘… if slaughterhouses had glass walls would not all of us be vegetarians?’.

We should surely all work for the process of the slaughterhouse to become visible, and characterised by care and kindness to sheep, so that life at the - slaughterhouse - end for a sheep is without fear, stress, pain, or suffering. And towards such transparency, open-ness, and good practice as standard, let us heed the reports and images from those who have been able to see how sheep are treated in their slaughter, at the end. 

At This Time

The United Nations Climate Change Conference COP28 (Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC) has just ended. At COP28 last Sunday, during Food, Agriculture and Water Day, was launched Plant Based Treaty’s Report Safe and Just which looks at global food systems. The Report covers several matters key to sheep. Two dimensions are addressed in the Executive Summary (p 17) in these statements: 

‘If we combine all land required for farming animals for meat - including grazing pastures and land used to grow crops for animal feed - animal agriculture accounts for 83 per cent of global farming land.’ 

‘Transporting live animals is not only cruel and prolongs their suffering, but adds to the growing number of emissions associated with farming animals for food - a climate cost that is rarely factored in.’

Methane emissions are discussed in the Report (p 34) with the remark given:

‘The historical breakdown of annual anthropogenic CH4 demonstrates that animal farming has consistently remained the predominant methane source for more than a century, and this trend continues to escalate due to the increasing demand of meat and diary products.’ 

Of the global food system, it is said:

‘The global food system, which greatly influences every aspect of the biosphere, is a primary driver of environmental degradation in the Anthropocene epoch. Central to this system is animal agriculture, which has a considerable ecological footprint. The clearing of forests for pastures destroys habitats, releases carbon, and removes carbon sinks. Monocultures for animal feed create biodiversity deserts.’ (p 44).

And it is also said: 

‘In terms of the efficiency of our global food system, animal products provide only 37 per cent of global protein intake and a mere 18 per cent of calories. Yet they are responsible for 83 per cent of agricultural land-use and 71 per cent of deforestation. The inefficiency of animal-based products, coupled with their substantial environmental impact across various areas, clearly indicates that an animal-centric global food system is not viable for meeting the needs of the 21st century.’

In regards land use, it is advised in in the Report:

‘Moving to a diet that excludes animal products has transformative potential, reducing food’s land use by approximately 3.1 billion ha (a 75 per cent reduction), which is crucial if we want to mitigate the climate crisis, restore integrity, and provide healthy food for all (Poore and Nemecek, 2018).’ 

The prominent attention in the Safe and Just Report - in the Executive Summary - to live exports and their cruelty to animals is much for welcoming. For, cautious, welcoming too is that in this month in the UK the Animal Welfare (Livestock Exports) Bill was introduced to Parliament (on 4th December) and will be debated in Parliament (on 18th December).  

An end, throughout the world, to live exports of sheep is heartily to be wished for. At this time of Christmastide, a period of festivity and revelry, what do sheep want for Christmas and for every day of the year? This must be the simple basics: good and right food; clean, fresh, drinking-water; access to shelter; good health; being with friends and family; peace and no unwanted disturbance. It can be noted that a feature of ‘holidaytime’ is people going for country walks, quite frequently in large groups, and often having dogs with them. So, a gift from humans to sheep is for people to ensure that their dogs - predators to sheep - are always on leads near sheep.  

Promisingly Better

It was a promising announcement last week, in the supporting document to the Kings’ Speech to Parliament (‘The King’s Speech 2023’, Prime Minister’s Office and OGL, 7th November 2023): the UK Government intends to ban live exports of certain animals - sheep, cattle, pigs, goats, horses - from Great Britain for slaughter and fattening. Method for delivery is to be the Animal Welfare (Livestock Exports) Bill. But, as Compassion in World Farming (CIWF) reminded us, in its 7th November 2023 press release welcoming the announcement, ‘In May this year, the Government reneged on its manifesto promise to deliver a live exports ban when it dropped the Kept Animals Bill.’ In one of the press release’s Notes to Editors CIWF provided this expanded information: ‘In May 2023, the Government dropped the Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill, which would have banned live exports for slaughter or fattening from Great Britain, despite the Bill having received cross-party support during previous Commons stages.’ An important context of relevance is provided in the same press release in the CIWF Chief Public Affairs Manager’s words ‘…it is vital that the Animal Welfare (Livestock Exports) Bill is quickly introduced to Parliament, so it can be passed and implemented well before the next general election.’ The dimension is critical because dissolution of the current UK Parliament must have happened before or on 17th December 2024.

Live animal exports put animals at risk of suffering in various ways. Around the world, sheep are subjected to live export in large numbers. So, it is vital for sheep that live export of them stops everywhere. This year, New Zealand banned live animal exports trade and in Australia a process was started of phasing out live sheep exports by sea. Momentum in banning live exports of sheep, and of all animals, needs to build across the globe, with other countries following suit of early leaders. It is crucial for sheep’s welfare that the Animal Welfare (Livestock Exports) Bill is passed into law. And time is short. So, while it is promisingly better that the government in UK is promising to ban live animal exports from Great Britain, following breaking of the promise in the past, this time the promise must be kept.

The Sale, For Sheep

For sheep attending a sale, the experience is unlikely ever to be pleasant. The circumstance is unfamiliar to the sheep and of a type to - almost inevitably - bring stress to them and engender fear in them. The obligation of humans involved, therefore, is to see that they do everything they can to minimise unpleasantness for the sheep. 

We should remember too that sheep will also have to endure travel to and from a sale.

The essential sale format is: arrival; transfer to a pen; going in and out of a sale ring; transfer to a pen, departure. The hard landscape for the process is: the pens themselves; the passageways and raceways; the sale ring itself; the areas surrounding the ring providing the auctioneer’s rostrum, space for standing, tiered seating. Flooring too is hard, but the ring will have a covering of sawdust, as may have some other areas of flooring.

Characterising the sale is speed. Journeying from pen to ring, ring to pen, sheep are kept on the move. Sheep are required to be moved about in the ring, to be displayed to all viewers and potential buyers. Once bidding for them is completed, sheep are needed to leave the ring quickly - so that the next lot of sheep can enter the ring. All this produces the potential for ‘moving on’ to be more important than taking best care of the sheep and treating them with the utmost gentleness. To be hemmed in by the hard material of the ring itself, with entrance and exit gates closed, and with a crowd of people surrounding - some standing and some on rising-up seating must be terrifying to sheep, and especially since they are seeing the sight from a level lower than humans do. And for a sheep in the ring, on its own, apart from humans, and without consolation and ‘protection’ from being with fellow sheep, being in the ring must be particularly frightening. The sheep must feel especial desperation and desire to try jumping out of the ring. It risks harming itself in leaping at the hard boundary.

Sometimes a show will precede a sale. For those sheep who participate in the show, they will have the processes of the show ‘for getting through’; therefore, an extra element to their day.

There are variations to the routine ‘sheep in the ring’ kind of sale. For example, a sale may happen in pens and outdoors. This must in many ways be less stressful to the sheep, provided they are not outside in pens for a long time when weather is hot or wet or cold. At the Kelso Ram Sales, very large event though it is, with many sale rings, each ring is in an individual marquee, largely open-sided, and with sheep who are awaiting selling in that particular ring being penned in that same marquee - and thus nearby company to those in the ring. The ring is composed of metal hurdles; only two small tiers are present for people to stand upon; and, of course, grass is underfoot. So, in all, not so ‘alien’ as a standard indoor sale ring. 

There seems to be no dearth of legislation and regulation and advice concerning how livestock markets should be, and how they should operate. DEFRA’s guidance document ‘Livestock at farm shows and markets: welfare regulations’ (18th June 2019) represents a good summary of the situation overall. In the document is listed ‘the main legislation that governs animal welfare at shows and markets’. Provided is the information ‘Local authorities enforce health and welfare legislation at markets’. And explained in the document are the powers concerning markets of the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA). DEFRA also has a 1990 publication Code of Practice – Welfare of Animals in Livestock Markets PB0409. 

Key players in relation to livestock markets are the Livestock Auctioneers’ Association Limited (LAA), and the Humane Slaughter Association (HSA). The LAA, it says, ‘works to ensure that Livestock Auction Markets throughout England and Wales are working to the highest standards of health and safety and animal welfare, and complete and accurate traceability.’ It has a MartSafe Training Programme ‘for all staff within the Livestock Auction Market, from drovers to auctioneers, administrators to fieldsmen.’ The Units of the Programme are as follows: Animal Behaviour, Safe Handling, People Behaviour, Animal Welfare. The HSA provides a detailed guide Humane Handling of Livestock, the focus of which is ‘the handling of animals in markets’. The ‘Recommendations for Handling Animals in Markets : Moving Animals In/Around/Out of the Sale Ring’ poster from HSA and LLA (HSA & LLA Market Posters Series) is clear information for the animal handler in the sale ring.

It appears there is not a shortage of legislation, regulation and instruction on how livestock sales should be.  But if there is a gap and difference between ‘what should be happening’ and ‘what is happening’, it needs addressing. Since a day at the sale is manifestly not nice for sheep, we must look for ways of improvement and amelioration. Selling sheep directly from farms - by using internet live-streaming for example - and therefore the sheep not needing to travel, or suffer the whole livestock sale process, could be an alternative selling method on occasions. Selling from pens or from grassy fields that have been sectioned up for the day, rather than in the sale ring, could make being sold a less tough and fearsome an experience for sheep. These are straws in the wind. For sheep’s sake, let us search for and find a much better way of selling of sheep than by the traditional ‘cockpit’ ring method.

Sight ‘Unseen’

The impacts upon sheep who are in areas of war can largely only be guessed at. Media and other reports communicate what is happening to humans, but what is occurring to any sheep present is rarely spoken of. Sheep and their circumstances in a war situation are surely noticed, but it is as if the sight is edited out to be sight ‘unseen’. It can only be conjectured what the reasons are for the avoidance. Are sheep being dismissed by humans as of no importance? Or is it that, though humans are observing sheep, unconsciously they are not ‘clocking’ them in their minds? It can be noted that animals overall tend not to attract much attention when amid war, but there seems to be a hierarchy in the matter, with sniffer dogs and people’s pets at least getting some focus of attention from humans. 

In war-between-humans contexts, sheep may be in the wrong place at the wrong time: due to their location being in the line of fire; due to them being moved by humans with them because they represent economic entities and/or a foodstuff if needed.

Here is an example of the impact upon sheep of war and conflict. Within ‘The Animals in Conflict Timeline’ in its 18th March 2021 blog ‘How animals are harmed by armed conflicts and military activities’, the organisation Conflict and Environment Observatory conveys that in the Gulf War 1990-91 ‘More than 80 per cent of livestock in Kuwait died, including 790,000 sheep’.

War and conflict between people is a human creation. Sheep in a theatre of war are innocent victims there. The organisation Animal Ethics remarks that ‘Nonhuman animals’ suffering during armed conflicts is often overlooked or deemed irrelevant in the face of human suffering, both by the parties to the conflict and by the general public.’ (‘Animals and war’ blog, 17th June 2022).

So, while the media is telling us what is happening to humans at war and portraying what they are undergoing, what sheep are experiencing usually goes unreported and unmentioned. Why is this? Is it because sheep are regarded by humans as their inferiors and who do not matter?  Whatever the reason, what occurs to sheep in war is a story largely untold.

Rough Handling

Humans’ handling of sheep is often rough, unjustifiably and unnecessarily so. It would appear that rough handling stems from a mindset that a) perceives sheep as items rather than as living, sentient, creatures, b) does not have high regard for sheep, c) follows traditional practice without questioning it.   

Now that sheep in the UK have legal recognition of being sentient - they have feelings, so they experience fear and stress, feel pain - any human behaviour towards sheep which does not recognise that sentience is unacceptable.

In essence it seems that rough handling happens due to those in the sheepfarming world - sheepfarmers, handlers, drovers, shearers etc - often seeing sheep as inanimate objects rather than as live feeling beings like humans. Moreover, sheep do not seem to be looked on as individuals. In general, the process of sheep handling is not characterised by sufficient care and compassion.

While some handling of sheep occurs outside the farm, some of it does not. What happens on a farm is not usually seen - unless that farm features on television or it holds open days for the public. Both situations are hardly likely to represent routine circumstances. In the routine of the sheep farm, main handling of sheep will likely to be moving them and attending to them. Activity at shows can be seen. Largely, only those persons whose work is involved with sheep are at sales - therefore farmers (and their families), auctioneers and their staff, livestock transporters. Few people, other than slaughterhouse operatives, get to see what happens in a slaughterhouse.

Both DEFRA and the RSPCA both define how handling should and should not be.

DEFRA states 

‘Sheep should not be caught by the fleece alone. They should be handled or restrained by means of a hand or an arm under the neck (holding the neck wool, if necessary) with the other arm placed on or around the rear. Lifting or dragging sheep by the fleece, tail, ears, horns or legs is unacceptable. Care should be taken with horns, which may be broken off if sheep are roughly handled.’ (Code of Recommendations for the Welfare of Livestock: Sheep, August 2003).

DEFRA has also provided the Guidance document ‘Livestock at farm shows and markets: welfare regulations’ (last updated 18th June 2019). 

The RSPCA instructs
‘Sheep must be handled:

a) quietly and calmly at all times
b) only as firmly as is necessary to keep the animal safe and under control, and
c) with care to avoid unnecessary pain and distress.

The behaviour of sheep must be taken into account when they are being moved, so as to avoid unnecessary fear or distress and potential compromises to their welfare.’ 

Among information it then gives is

‘Sheep may baulk at apparent dead ends, shadows and changes in the in the colour/pattern of flooring.’ 

The RSPCA goes on to say

‘Sheep must not be caught by the fleece alone, nor lifted or dragged by the fleece, limbs, ears or tail, nor roughly handled by the horns.’ 

It provides the information ‘Horns, particularly of young sheep, can be damaged or broken if sheep are roughly handled by them.’

The handling instructions then are

‘Sheep must be handled or restrained by means of a hand or arm under the neck (holding, but not pulling, the neck wool if necessary) with the other arm placed on or around the rear.

Electric goads must not be present or used at any site.

Sticks must not be used for hitting sheep.’

It then gives the information ‘Sticks or other benign (non-harmful) handling aids may only be used as extensions of the arms.’

The last instruction is

‘Heavily pregnant ewes (those in the last two months of pregnancy) must:

a) only be handled when absolutely necessary, and
b) be handled with care to avoid distress and injury which may result in premature lambing.’

The information follows ‘The last two months of pregnancy is a critical time for the ewe as this is when the vast majority of foetal growth occurs. It is therefore important to minimise stress during this time. Handling should be kept to a minimum, and only when necessary, such as to monitor their body condition or to administer veterinary treatments.’
(RSPCA welfare standards Sheep, August 2023)

In its ‘Sheep welfare issues’ document the RSPCA gives this handling summary

‘Sheep are prey animals that can be easily frightened, stressed or injured by inappropriate handling. They should always be handled carefully, and should not be unnecessarily isolated from other sheep for long periods.’  

Some rough handling of sheep seems to be driven by human requirement, actual or perceived, for speed. This is especially so at a sale where a lot of sheep need to be put through the whole sale process, and to be well-seen by all viewers, in a certain amount of time. So, sheep are shoved and harried about and risk being hurt or bruised as drovers/handlers move them around - quickly.

Rough handling of sheep should never happen. When sheep handling is necessary, sheep should be handled with more care, more consideration, more sensitivity, and more gentleness - such as they display to us.

Human Viewpoint

How humans see non-human animals is what produces how they treat them. Speciesism is a word to mean an attitude of a species of seeing itself as superior to another or others. The word was first used in 1970 by Dr Richard D Ryder.  

Definitions of speciesism show some variation. 

Cambridge Dictionary gives its meaning as ‘the idea that one species (= set of animals with the same characteristics that can breed from another), especially human beings, is more important and should have more rights than another’. 

Oxford Languages defines it as ‘the assumption of human superiority leading to the exploitation of animals’.  

Collins English Dictionary’s definition is ‘a belief of humans that all other species of animals are inferior and may therefore be used for human benefit without regard to the suffering inflicted’. 

PeTA, whose mission statement is ‘ANIMALS ARE NOT OURS to experiment on, eat, wear, use for entertainment, or abuse in any other way’ depicts speciesism as ‘the human-held belief that all other animal species are inferior.’ Then continuing, ‘Speciesist thinking involves considering animals - who have their own desires, needs, and complex lives - as means to human ends. This supremacist line of “reasoning” is used to defend treating other living, feeling beings as property, objects, or even ingredients. It’s a bias rooted in denying others their own agency, interests, and self-worth, often for personal gain.

This toxic worldview also leads humans to draw non-existent distinctions between animal species, based solely on the purpose that those animals might serve. For example, most humans wouldn’t dream of treating their dog the way pigs are treated in the food industry, even though pigs are able to experience the same, pain, joy, fear, and misery that canines do.’ 

Humans having a speciesist attitude towards non-human animals - seeing them as inferior - will perceive those non-human animals as not as same value and importance as themselves. From this attitude, conscious or unconscious, will be delivered humans viewing those non-human animals as less worthy than themselves, as suitable for treating less well than themselves, as appropriate for use for human purpose and gain, as representing humans’ property for doing with as they will and want. 

As the quote above from PeTA portrays, different non-human animals can have differing levels of value to humans. Clearly dogs are high on the scale of human regard. (It is perhaps no wonder that so much sheep worrying by dogs occurs.) Sheep appear not to have at all high esteem in the human mind; they are regarded of much less stature than they deserve, and despite that they are gentle, intelligent, and of very good nature: and with the sad outcome that sheep are not - by a long way - treated as well as they ought to be.   

Humans seeing non-human animals as property, results in those non-human animals not being treated well as, or as ‘equals but different’ to, humans. Of we humans Gary L Francione remarks ‘When we recognize that animals have a right not to be used as property, we reject treating them exclusively as means to ends. We recognize that we cannot justify imposing any suffering or death on them incidental to their use as resources. We stop our institutionalized exploitation of them.’ Francione is of the opinion that, as sentient beings, non-human animals should be treated as persons (Why Veganism Matters: The Moral Value of Animals, 2020).

Humans’ speciesism, their arrogance and superiority towards non-human animals, results in the latter being treated by humans as their property, for their use, and in a manner to meet those humans’ requirements. If they saw non-human animals as their equals, and of equal worth as themselves, humans would not be treating non-human animals inhumanely and inappropriately.