It happens to every animal activist at some point.  You find yourself immersed in research about the horrors of “animal production” and the feeling of hopelessness just overwhelms you and you just want to bury your head.

I believe that I’ve mentioned before, but I work a day job as well as running YDV.  My day job is a 8-5 thing that is, quite frankly, un-fullfilling and has nothing to do with animal activism.  After work I come home and take care of my 9 animals and then sit down to bring you the best in vegan news.  Your Daily Vegan is my passion, it is rewarding and something that I hope continues to grow into a respected source for all things vegan.  That said, it also exposes me to the horrors of the way humans treat the other animals on this planet.  Please don’t get me wrong, I have been vegan for many years, vegetarian for longer.  I know about factory farming, puppy mills and the like.  But to immerse yourself in it daily, and see the eyes of these animals who are suffering is…draining to say the least.

For instance, today I decided to research pet food.  ABC did this snippet on vegan pets, and since I am still struggling with the vegan cat issue, I decided to watch it.  That led me to looking into what we feed our animals.  So then I came across this…

The National Renderers Association.  Have you ever heard of them?  Um, yeah me neither.  Rendering is a process that “converts raw animal tissue into various protein, fat, and mineral products.”  The “finished product’ is used by Agri-businesses in feed ingredients for poultry, pork, beef, dairy producers, aquaculture and pet food.  Oh, I want to mention that they also use “recycled vegetable oil” from restaurants in this rendering process as well.  Yummy!

The United States currently produces, slaughters, and processes approximately 100 million hogs, 35 million cattle, and eight billion chickens annually.   By-products include hides, skins, hair, feathers, hoofs, horns, feet, heads, bones, toe nails, blood, organs, glands, intestines, muscle and fat tissues, shells, and whole carcasses.  (souce: An overview of the rendering industry.  Meeker and Hamilton. pg 2)

This, people is what they render.  The rendering process is not only physical, but it is a chemical one as well.  Heat is used to “cook” this stuff and turn it into “feed ingredients” for farm animals and companion animals, well at least 85% of it anyway.  That’s enough to make me gag, what about you?  If you want some disgusting good reading check out Valley Proteins/Carolina By-Products website.  Their slogan is “What you throw away…we want to conserve.”  To reiterate, they are turning the shit left over from slaughter into feed for the animals that people consume and food for your pet. Hey, I am all for recycling but I don’t want to feed my animal food chock full of chemicals and death.  Maybe that’s just me.  And for all those who have told me how much they love meat well, now you know that with every bite you take you are consuming the by-products of the millions of animals slaughtered before. Mmmm!

To tie this all together, the ABC snippet questions whether we should feed our animals the same thing that we eat.  It appears to me that we already do.  We raise animals for slaughter by feeding them rendered, already slaughtered animal by-products.  Then we slaughter those animals and render their by-products and make more animal feed from it.  And the whole time we use the rendered products to feed our companion animals.  This whole process is cyclical and disturbing.

And so, after researching this (which, the rendering websites I went to showed cute cow, pic and sheep pictures, WTF?!) I feel drained.  I know that my work for the animals is one that is important, just like I know that I won’t stop just because I’m overwhelmed.  It’s times like these that I need to remind myself why I fight and why I encourage everyone else to fight as well.  And so I am going to take a trip down memory lane of my visit to  Farm Sanctuary.   I had the immense pleasure of going there last October and nothing has impacted my journey through veganism more.  On that note, here are some cuties that I met and spent some time with.  They reminded me why I do what I do.  Their affection to this human was astounding.  I am forever grateful.

Some friends….

Chickie Friends

Comin to say hi!

Baby who's missing his hoof

Hello Mr. Goat