PART of my work defending animals from abuse involves taking part in campaigns organised by larger organisations like VIVA (Vegetarian International Voice for Animals).
I have to admit that sometimes I'm not in the mood to go treading the streets holding a placard and handing out leaflets, especially on a freezing cold day. But then I remember why I got involved in animal rights in the first place, and so off I go.
Last Saturday a colleague and I went out to Prestatyn and then on to the streets of Mold (the day before Mothers Day) to take part in a day of action organised by Viva, urging shoppers to help Britain's hardest working mother - the dairy cow.
Jean Bennington and me - in a cow’s mask - take Viva's message to the streets
This Mothers Day Viva wanted to shatter the myth of contentment and reveal how the dairy cow is actually Britain's hardest working mother.
After giving birth she will have only a short time with her newborn calf before he is whisked away - never to be seen again. As a final insult, her breast milk - meant to nourish her baby - is stolen and sold.
I personally witnessed the trauma of dairy cows after having their calves removed. While out taking an evening stroll late last summer, I recall the anguished high pitched bellowing of cows at the far end of a field (see photo below).
I cried because the night before I'd watched their babies playing in the last rays of the evening sun.
Although the mental anguish of losing their babies may wane, a dairy cow's physical suffering is constant. The huge volume of milk they are forced to produce often results in emaciation and relentless hunger and the enormous strain on her udders leaves her prone to mastitis and lameness.
Her calves also face a miserable future. Females face the same gruelling cycle of pregnancy and lactation as their mothers. Meanwhile males, often too scrawny for beef, may be shot in the head at just a few days old or sent on long journeys to continental veal farms. When they reach these farms, calves will be confined to individual pens for the first eight weeks of their short lives, deprived of stimulation and social contact.
These days I can't look at a field of cows without feeling sad.
My hope is that one day people will open their eyes up to the suffering we inflict upon these gental giants and give them the protection they deserve.
