After months of planning and months of schedule conflicts, my buddy, Miranda, and I finally had the opportunity to visit The Gentle Barn in sunny Santa Clarita! Reputed to be a safe haven for neglected, abandoned, and abused animals, it seemed the perfect Sunday destination for an animal rights crusader and a beaver!
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The Gentle Barn was founded in 1999 by Ellie Laks, who started taking in lost, sick, and injured animals at the age of seven, only to learn that her parents were getting rid of them while she was at school! Though this upset her greatly, she vowed to fulfill her parents’ promise that when she grew up, she could have as many animals as she wanted. Now, she has over 170, primarily those animals in such bad shape that adoption agencies will not take them. After lots of care and love, many of these animals now roam the yards looking for playmates! For example:
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Monty the Turkey was plucked from a Thanksgiving fate and landed in the Gentle Barn, where he has plenty to be thankful for! Folks here don’t eat turkeys; they cuddle with them! Who knew that a turkey could enjoy a cuddle? They’re intense birds, and often vain, but they’re friendly too! When I met Monty, he was trying to keep up with a chicken who had leapt through this small portal, only to find that his enormous turkey body would not fit! His face turned from a calm blue to a bright red with frustration, but he would not listen to reason: “Go around!”
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Biscuit the Pig was also spared from becoming dinner! As a piglet, this bionic boar was the recipient of a growth hormone—probably porcine somatotropin (pST)—as is common in the pork industry. This hormone charges the pituitary gland and makes pigs reach adult size in 3-6 months instead of 4-5 years! Though Biscuit was rescued, he kept growing! Now he weighs half a ton, but Biscuit makes no excuses, maintaining a strict, vegetarian diet and a rigorous daily routine of 45-minute jogs around the barnyard. This fit pig earns his naps and belly rubs!
Faith is blind. No, really, she is. Hers is one of the more disturbing stories, which she related over a brushing session. She was taken from her mother as a calf and placed in a veal crate, where she could not move, and was force-fed hay instead of her mother’s milk, which was reserved for humans. This led to malnourishment and conjunctivitis, which left her blind. Luckily, Faith has since been restored by the hardworking volunteers at The Gentle Barn! Now, she spends her days getting brushed, petted and hugged by people who care!
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The Gentle Barn is a delightful collection of success stories, but it also serves as a chilling reminder of the horrors from which it has rescued these animals. Take, for instance, Lazar the Horse, a rescue from a Premarin plant. Premarin is a hormonal drug made from mare’s urine that is used to alleviate menopause symptoms. To harvest this urine, mares are kept constantly pregnant and locked in cells for 8 months with a catheter. When they finally give birth, their babies are taken from them to be slaughtered for glue or gelatin, and then the mares are impregnated again. Now, after years of being malnourished and abused, Lazar is unable to add weight to her gaunt frame, which produces gaping bed sores every time she lies down. I couldn’t bring myself to take a photo with her.
Also, the Gentle Barn changed my perception of the dairy industry, reminding me that mammals only produce milk when they’re about to have babies. It used to be that cows only mated once per year, their calves grew up with their mothers, and they all got to go to pasture between milkings. Now, at least in industrial dairy, the cows are kept constantly pregnant in dirt lots, and when they give birth, their babies are either packed away in veal crates or raised on “milk substitute” until they’re big enough for slaughter or lactation. This added a whole new level of stink to the filthy feed lot I pass every time I come down into the San Joaquin Valley on I-5!
If I may at least end this tale on a high note, The Gentle Barn does great work for animals and for people. The animals here are happy and have brighter futures than they could otherwise have imagined. Also, The Gentle Barn hosts regular therapy sessions with the animals for handicapped and at-risk kids, especially those convicted of animal abuse. It is an organization dedicated to education and rehabilitation, and fortunately, it will soon spread to new locations across the country! As an animal myself in a human world, I think their work is pretty darn wonderful.
If you want to learn more about the meat and dairy industry, or if you just like to play with animals, pay the Gentle Barn a visit! It’s open for visitors from 10:00-2:00 on Sundays for a donation of $10. As they say, you can’t have a bad day after you’ve hugged a cow!
Good baah for now!!
