The Heartbreaking Story of How Animals Are Bred for the European Pet Trade
PETA Germany went undercover over a period of several months to investigate Dutch animal breeders who supply guinea pigs, hamsters, rabbits, birds and other small animals to major European pet shops.
Neglect. Sick, terrified animals. Rotting corpses. Cannibalism. They found horrors worse than they could ever have expected.
Read on to see some of the shocking images from the investigation.
PETA Germany found thousands of animals in severely crowded cages.
Severe crowding and stress lead to bite injuries such as this one.
Animals are “mass-produced” in dark, filthy facilities, where tiny cages are stacked from floor to ceiling.
They are kept in cramped cages for transport to wholesalers, who will then sell them to pet shops in the Czech Republic, Germany and the Netherlands.
Many don’t survive the harrowing conditions.
The investigators found many dead animals whose bodies were simply left to rot.
And freezers which were full of corpses.
Thousands of animals may be bred in one small windowless room.
Breeders cram as many animals as possible into confined spaces in order to maximise their profits.
Birds were subjected to the same appalling treatment.
Many of the surviving animals were too sick and terrified to move.
Even smaller breeders often keep animals in hellish conditions.
This guinea pig lies where he died, to be eaten by maggots.
Numerous animals were forced to live amid their own excrement in filthy cages.
Many of the animals were suffering from severe dehydration and jumped desperately at their water bottles after the investigators refilled them.
It was too late for these rabbits, who had died of thirst.
In addition to being severely crowded, the metal cages were totally barren.
These budgies had no room even to stretch their wings in the tiny space.
This traumatised bird pecked at her dead cagemate.
These birds sat in a densely packed cage as they waited to be transported.
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The cruelty exposed in these facilities was not isolated: random investigations of small facilities that sell animals to large and small merchants also showed harrowing conditions. Undercover investigations – at roughly 15 breeding and wholesale outlets – documented more than a dozen apparent violations of the Dutch Animal Welfare Act. A criminal complaint was filed against a total of 11 breeders and wholesalers from Germany and the Netherlands.
Unsuspecting customers often have no idea about the horror from which these animals have come – or what kind of industry they’re unwittingly supporting.
THIS is what’s wrong with the pet trade. The best way to end the cruelty is to boycott animal breeders and always adopt rather than buying.
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