Mink Farms
Opinion is divided on breeding mink in mink farms. In the Netherlands there are very few people who want to wear real fur coats anymore,
apart from the upper-class. On TV you often see members of the royal family or politicians with their wives wearing real fur coats.
All fur produced in The Netherlands is exported, mainly to Scandinavia. In The Netherlands alone, there are 200 mink farms where 2.5 million mink are bred per year.
The mink are held in cages measuring 90x40x35 cm and there are holes in the cages to let the mink move from cage to cage.
There are two or three mink to a cage. Several farms are now experimenting with holding mink in groups, this means that the young stay with their mothers til skinning time.
And are not taken away between 7-11 weeks old. It is possible that this method of mink keeping is beneficial to the animals because it is more social and gives less stress
to the animals. The young mink are born in the spring and live for 7 months before they are killed (skinned). The mink are killed by carbon monoxide poisoning.
This is a quick and painless death. Many people think that mink farms are obsolete as the demand for fur coats is gone. This may be true, but many people wear leather shoes
and jackets and do not consider this an issue.
It is very hard to defend why it is necessary to have mink farms in The Netherlands when there is no demand for the fur in this country.
Imagine that The Netherlands would only produce for own use, then there would be no economy at all. You can say what you want about mink farms,
but they do not mistreat their animals. The food they get is mush, but it is high quality mush. The cages are small but every time I go and get food,
I see the mink playing or taking an interest. I never see listless or stereotypical behaviour in the short time I am there.
The stories about mink getting drugged food to keep them calm so that their fur is not damaged also appear to be untrue.
The animals are selected for their calm and social characters. Animals that show stereotypical behaviour or that are very nervous or scared are not bred further.
This means that the animals used for breeding are mostly not aggressive or stressed. In addition, over the last 25 years, breeders have made a lot of modifications
to their farms for the well-being of the animals, which has been a considerable investment.
In no other animal sector in The Netherlands has so much money been invested.
It is, of course, a fact that the breeders are obliged to handle their animals well, after all, a damaged fur is not worth much.
For those who want to know more about the pros and cons of mink farming, I can recommend the monthly magazine “Pelsdierenhouder”.
There is a lot of information about this area and also about the mink itself. I managed to find a lot of information on illnesses, behaviour et….
The NFE (Dutch federation of exclusive fur breeders) is open to questions and has a website where you can ask them. www.nfe.nl,.
I used to work as an electrician in an abattoir and am regularly at a mink farm. I do not want to say that the sight of mink in tiny cages is a pleasant one but compared to
pigs, calves, and chickens, the mink is better off in my opinion. I was sacked by my employer because I caused too many problems when I saw (ignorant) farmers
offloading their cattle. It is incredible to see how these people unload their trucks. If the animals cannot be kicked out of the truck,
then they are dragged over cattle grids using chains. Pigs arrive in this manner all day long and they are packed into a hall where they are kept wet all day.
By the time they are slaughtered, the hall is full of blood, pieces of ear and other body parts because the pigs have been fighting:Maybe due to the stress?
Then there are the battery hens that can hardly walk and have burnt beaks are half bald and packed into cages together. They are also worse off than mink in my opinion.