I felt physically ill after visiting a touch farm today

mikeruurds

Hi all

My wife and I are both animal lovers. We have a pet hamster and love visiting "touch farms" - my wife used to live on a farm in South Africa and misses all the animals.

I decided to surprise her with a trip to a touch farm in the South-East today. We drove down from Dublin this afternoon and paid our €8 at the gate.

The small animals; guinea pigs, rabbits, ducks, chickens etc. are all kept in a sheltered outdoor tunnel structure which is illuminated by very dull flourescent lighting. The stink was pretty bad inside the tunnell, very damp and mouldy. The tunnell walls are incredibly dusty and full of cobwebs. I felt pretty claustrophobic in the structure. Ok... I know it's a farm and not a hotel, but the conditions were pretty dire.

Some of the animals are kept in cages and others in small paddocks. Most of the cages/paddocks were filthy and quite obviously hadn't been cleaned in a while. Hardly any of the animals had water in their cages and those that did had containers with a liquid that was filthy and smelly - I know I wouldn't like any animals drinking it. It also looked like all of the animals were eating the same food which looked like bird seed. There wasn't much of it around either. Any "food" was loosely scattered in with the bedding and was mixed with faeces.

The place was infested with field mice. We witnessed a miserable looking guinea pig that was sharing his cage with two mice. They appeared to be entering the structure through holes in the wall.

I'm not someone who feels ill easily, but my visit to the farm today left both my wife and I feeling physically ill. I think it was just an overwhelming empathy for the poor animals there. There must have been at least 50 animals in total living in that place. No natural light. A filthy environment. Little or no food or water. We didn't stay long... after 5 minutes we'd had enough. We didn't see the larger farm animals so we can't comment on their condition. I always thought animal activists were a little loony, but after my experience today I'll be the first in line at the next rally.

What do you think we should do. I'd like to see this place inspected by some ISPCA officials and the owners punished. No animal should live in those conditions. We've visited the Dublin Zoo and other touch farms in Wicklow... we've never seen anything like this before. My wife is going to call the ISPCA tomorrow and file a complaint.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Kind regards
Mike & Liezl Ruurds

Thomas_S_Hunterson

It's a horrible thing to witness, the ISPCA is probably the best course of action.

I dont know how long this thread is going to last though, given board's recent challenge

junkyard

I'd certainly complain if I was you, the laws against animal cruelty in this country are a joke. I hope they sort it out.

mikeruurds

Yeah. It's ok if it gets shut down. We don't want to be the cause of any litigation against boards.

I'm going to remove the name of the touch farm.

We'll keep you all posted with any updates.

Thanks
Mike

Strokesfan

That's terrible - I'd have thought that being a farm open to the public that the areas on view would at least be maintained properly. But if these people can't even be bothered to maintain it to even promote the right image, they obviously don't care.
You know yourself what kind of conditions are acceptable so I think you should go ahead and make the complaint and see what the officials say. I would maybe write a letter to the owner or manager detailing what you saw and what you would like to see done to improve conditions...
I hope that ISPCA will follow it up

mikeruurds

Thanks for all the responses

The thing that really ticked me off was that families with kids were being paraded through the place. Farms like this one are supposed to be a shining example to the young - they should be showing the RIGHT way to look after animals.

Even worse, they charge a fair whack for the pleasure of walking around the place, and it's quite obvious that the money doesn't go to caring for the animals.

Our hamster wouldn't last a week in that place.

Mike

mikeruurds

Strokesfan wrote:

That's terrible - I'd have thought that being a farm open to the public that the areas on view would at least be maintained properly. But if these people can't even be bothered to maintain it to even promote the right image, they obviously don't care.
You know yourself what kind of conditions are acceptable so I think you should go ahead and make the complaint and see what the officials say. I would maybe write a letter to the owner or manager detailing what you saw and what you would like to see done to improve conditions...
I hope that ISPCA will follow it up

Thanks Strokesfan. I'll take your advice and write a letter to the owners. When we looked the place up on the net, we read that it was a family farm and that it was the ideal "day out" for the family - the gist of the advert was that the family cared deeply for the welfare of the animals. The reality appears to be far removed from our initial expectations.

Mike

Our man in Havana

Mike can you pm me the details of this place, it sounds horrid!!! I once raced to a pet farm with info on a new pet they had bought a praire dog only to find it in with the russian hamsters totally unsuitable!

mikeruurds

Just a quick update:

I spoke with the ISPCA inspector for Carlow (he's also solely responsible for 8 other counties) yesterday. He informed me that he knew the farm in question very well as he'd been there a few times in the past to investigate similar claims.

He promised to pop in tomorrow to have a look at the animals' living conditions, but didn't exactly fill me with much confidence that things would improve for them. It seems that animals at "touch farms" are not protected very well by legislation and that he would have to prove serious negligence or intentional abuse to get anything done. His only option seems to be improvement by embarrassment... tryin to shame the owners into doing something to improve the conditions. He says that things had improved slightly when he made his last visit to the place 12 months ago.

I can understand his position. He's prioritising his limited time by looking after animals that are in serious distress. The ISPCA seems hopelessly under-resourced.

I'll keep you all posted if I hear anything else.

Mike

EGAR

ISPCA or Carlow SPCA?

The latters details are public domain that why I post them here:

Carlow S.P.C.A.
Hon. Secretary: Mrs. Stephanie Curran
Telephone: 087 269 8477
Inspector: Mrs. Jean Bird,
Tel: 087 2698477

mikeruurds

Hi Egar

We contacted the Carlow SPCA and were directed to the Inspector

Mike

Sigma Force

This the place in Carlow? It's a disgrace and the SPCA won't do anything about it, when we vististed a couple of years bag there was a budgie dying at the bottom of a filthy over crowded cage, mice running (wild mice not pet ones) all over the pens of the rabbits it stank to high heaven, they are kept in mushroom tunnels where it's too dark. Surely the lack of light and hygiene is a good enough reason for the SPCA to do something about it. This guy is getting away with it for much too long. He also offered to sell people hamsters while I was there..which a 'pet farm' isn't allowed to do.
We visited about 3 years ago and the place hasn't changed the SPCA aren't doing enough about this hell hole wether they are busy or not, if it were a bunch of dogs they would be there like a shot and he'd be in the papers but because it's small animals (there are other animals but the small animals and birds are in the worst conditions) noone cares enough to shut this cowboy down.
I fully understand the SPCA have to have hard evidence and the laws restrict them but how manky does a place have to be before something can be done.
Animals must be provided with food shelter and water but it doesn't state that the water etc has to be clean.

It's very easy to prove neglect at that place they just have to walk in and take a few photos, the filth is staring you in the face (and up the nose phew!)

mikeruurds

Hi Guineapigrescue

It's the same place... an absolute disgrace. I wish we could do more about this situation. When you walk around the place, it's quite clear that the owners don't give a damn about the animals and do as little as possible.

We also saw at least 5 wild mice scurrying about and harassing a poor miserable guinea pig.

It's depressing that people can get away, and even profit from this type of abuse and neglect.

Mike

junkyard

I wonder do the animal rights activists know about this place? It might be an idea to let them know.;)

luckat

If the ISPCA isn't helping, maybe you need to take a different route. This is a place that families visit, and it's unhygienic, you say? What about making a complaint to whatever body is in charge of hygiene in public spaces?

If they're taking money, presumably they're licensed, which means they should be kept up to a correct standard of hygiene. Are they grant-aided? Are they operating under the aegis of Bord Fáilte or the county where they farm?

There's also the question of insurance - are they insured against children becoming ill from petting animals living in faeces, etc?

FranknFurter

Also you might consider bringing this to the attention of the general media.
Animal cruelty issues such as this have been making news lately because of the circus industry being here during the summer.

b

Villain

I live about 4 miles from this place I think and its a disgrace went to a party for the nephew there a year ago and couldn't believe the state of the place. Glad someone reported it.