How Can You Talk to Kids About Factory Farming? But then came the coronavirus pandemic, which has killed more than 90,000 Americans and upended life and business in ways previously unimaginable. And in his small town, one of his neighbors from down the road recently went door to door asking if anyone wanted to buy his farm, a development that pained him. At Wulfekuhle’s farm, he and his employees, who all own a share of the business, have made little tweaks like adjusting the pigs’ diet and raising the temperatures inside the barns. We hope to see you there to witness this great event and help the animals of Furever Farm at the same time. Strikingly, it seems that this loving care flows in both directions. Already, he had heard of a few people preparing to file for bankruptcy. The first 100 people to buy a ticket will go into the draw to win a basket full of goodies generously donated by Organic Care. He takes to the road on a bike, with his last sow in the sidecar to visit his beloved Birgit, the daughter of a wealthy businessman, in the eastern part of Germany. We urgently need your help. In recent days, he said, employees there have called Wulfekuhle and other local producers at the last minute to see if they can send more inventory. Yes, the shots of misty early morning farmland and autumnal forests in upstate New York are gorgeous, but they pale in comparison to the endless close-ups of these porcine beauties. By the time he was 19, he was running his own place, called to a profession that wasn’t glamorous or even remotely easy but made him feel like he was doing something important. “You just don’t want to have to sell at the very bottom when things are horrible and nobody has the money to buy. “They keep restaurants chilly for a reason,” he said. https://www.facebook.com/events/358773274715209/, Yogi, Charlie, Sparkle, Gizmo, Donkey and Missy. “But it’s hard. Comis’ (ex-pig farmer} soul-bearing narrative carries us through his final year of farming pigs, the struggle to reinvent his life, and the ghosts that will haunt him forever. Monica Stanton is a news fellow at Stone Pier Press, an environmental publishing company with a food focus. Does “happy pigs make happy meat” really make sense? Time is running out to make a difference. The film is slated for public release in autumn 2019. I certainly do. Hog waste can contain potentially dangerous pathogens, pharmaceuticals and chemicals. “We just cried,” he recalled. Amidst the frenzied action, the camera focuses for a long moment on a sow blissfully lounging at the shore of the mud pit, nestling contentedly into the earth as she watches her family frolic. Black in color. Support the journalists that have been fighting back against dangerous disinformation since day one: Subscribe to Truthout’s daily newsletter and never miss a story. But he’s still nervous, worried about what could happen in coming weeks and months. This article was produced as part of a partnership between Stone Pier Press and Earth | Food | Life, a project of the Independent Media Institute. Buy a ticket now to be in the running! Comis’ (ex-pig farmer} soul-bearing narrative carries us through his final year of farming pigs, the struggle to reinvent his life, and the ghosts that will haunt him forever. He still vividly remembers the day he and his wife, Kathy, tearfully loaded pigs onto a truck, having sold them at rock-bottom prices that were not nearly enough to cover the expenses of their young farm. "Well I don't know … Can we count on you to make a small one-time or monthly donation to help us out?. A small farmer in Germany loses everything when he has to declare bankruptcy because he cannot compete with the large factory farms. Farmers are about life, he said, and the idea of killing the animals and the food they represent goes against every instinct. The National Pork Producers Council has estimated as many as 10 million hogs will be euthanized by the end of the summer because of coronavirus-related disruptions in meat processing. It’s sad. Food will be available by Joy of Flora and VSpot Pizza Bar. A drug company that makes animal drugs, purchased not by consumers but by factory farms, is advertising directly to consumers who will never actually purchase those drugs. In recent weeks, some operations have resumed, including at the Tyson Fresh Meats plant in Waterloo, where Wulfekuhle sends most of his pigs, but it hasn’t been the same. Some farmers like Wulfekuhle, whose operation usually brings roughly 34,000 pigs a year to market, saw the crisis coming and quickly made adjustments to try to slow the growth of their pigs before the worst of the pandemic hit the heartland. It’s not exactly a happy ending. We thought we were going to lose everything.”. Darren, Hayley & all the Furever Farm team. Argo has said that she was hoping to make a film about the ethics of eating animals for some time, and when she discovered pig farmer Bob Comis’s reckonings with his vocation in Salon and HuffPost, she knew he was the right subject. “It’s horrible,” Wulfekuhle said. Shine a light on government and corporate exploitation. Farmers’ hopes for respite from Trump-era struggles fade amid pandemic. The best thing you can do to help is start a small monthly donation today. Much like proponents of peaceful parenting, Comis explains that he herds his pigs and retrieves attempted escapees through strategies that play to their higher faculties (such as their attachment to the rest of the herd) rather than through confinement or punitive measures. We're already well into our October fundraiser and so far it's our slowest campaign of the year. But my worries were unfounded. I often wonder what motivates viewers to see activist films like this one when they know they’ll encounter saddening scenes of animal death. It is appropriate that a film such as this should be offered to help care for the pigs of Furever Farm whilst also raising awareness about them and our ability as humans to be compassionate. … The unknown is the scariest part.”. Barring any further disruptions, Wulfekuhle is hopeful he might be able to avoid euthanizing any of his animals. Pig farming is the raising and breeding of domestic pigs as livestock, and is a branch of animal husbandry.Pigs are farmed principally for food (e.g. He tries to stay positive in front of his staff. To slow their growth down in recent weeks in hopes of buying extra time, he raised the thermostat to about 74 degrees. When I sat down to watch The Last Pig, I did so with the slight trepidation of a seasoned environmental filmgoer. These Books Can Help. While environmental degradation and urgent attempts at climate action are both hurtling forth at breakneck speed, Argo’s film forces us to slow down and ask why, and for whom, we take action in the first place. The most important news stories of the day, curated by Post editors and delivered every morning. That has led him to think a lot about past crises — the swine flu epidemic a decade ago, when he and other farmers desperately worked to keep their pigs safe; the 1980s farm crisis his farm barely survived. I hope we can figure some of this out, but it looks awful right now.”. We urgently need your help. With packed farms and animals growing too large to be processed by plants not yet running at full capacity as companies try to keep vulnerable workers safe, many hog farmers are being forced to do the unthinkable: kill their pigs and dispose of their bodies instead of having them processed for food. Animal Activists South Australia (AASA) and littlemeBigV are thrilled to be bringing the film "The Last Pig" to Adelaide, and better yet, part proceeds of ticket sales will generously go to Furever Farm! “That’s just not what we do. And when Comis finally decides he must transition to plant farming, we remain in that pause. “And this isn’t their fault. In one of the film’s most joyous scenes, we watch the pigs splash, stomp, nuzzle and roll around beneath a spewing fountain of water at mud bath time.