Rabbit Advocacy Animal Matters

Canadian Food Inspection Agency Destroys Shepherd’s Life and Sheep

November 19, 2013 realfarmacy.com or https://www.naturalblaze.com/2013/04/farmed-and-dangerous-cfia-destroys.html

I am not a criminal. I’m a shepherd, farmer and writer who has been preserving rare breed Shropshire sheep for the last 12 years and farming various other heritage breeds and vegetables for the last 30.

Then, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) descended …uninvited… into my life, onto my farm, and forever changed the course of both. They killed my beautiful ewes and their unborn lambs to find out if they were healthy. They were. Now they are dead.

The CFIA and Minister of Agriculture ignored over 5,000 people who signed a petition to stop the killing. Their massacre of my rare genetics resulted in the Shropshire population falling to fewer than 80 heritage females left in all of Canada. The domino effect since they appeared has been devastating, it’s been a downward spiral from their first invasion. I keep telling myself “There are worse things”, and hang on.

Now the CFIA has charged myself, raw milk activist farmer Michael Schmidt and 2 others with numerous criminal charges including conspiracy, all for allegedly trying to save Canada’s heritage sheep.

I now have no income, no transportation, and am battling depression and post traumatic stress. I’m facing foreclosure and an astonishing $100,000. dollar legal defense fee for the upcoming criminal trial.If convicted, I face up to 12 YEARS IN JAIL and fines of $1.5 million. It’s not easy to admit, but pride aside—I need help.

It’s up to all of us to change unreasonable policies that prevent our food and farming freedom and destroy our agricultural biodiversity. We must protect our heritage breeds, our heirloom seeds, my farm…other small farms.

This dismal chapter of mine is just a detail—I’m not going to lay down just because I’m cold or broke or steamrollered by government. I am standing up, despite themIf I lose the farm—they win. And that would be another of their many wrongs.

Please help me keep my home – and keep the farm going. Any help you can offer WILL make a difference! You can find the whole story on ShropshireSheep.org/FarmedAndDangerous or on the Save Our Shrops Facebook Page . With your help, we’ll breathe life back into this farm once again. Thank-you so much… please help spread word of this situation and share. Montana Jones

Saving Sunshine the Goat

December 20, 2014

Thanks to your support this year, Animal Justice fought hard to help animals across the country. Let us tell you a story about a special goat named Sunshine.

Rescued as a baby by Sherry and Yan, the owners of Piebird Farmstay & Sanctuary in Nipissing Village, Ontario, Sunshine escaped the misery of a life in the dairy industry. Instead, he grew up frolicking in the countryside. His sunny personality and unique smile made him an instant favourite of everyone he met.

But last February, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency threatened to end Sunshine’s happy existence. The CFIA wanted to slaughter Sunshine. They claimed Sunshine had been born on a farm where a case of scrapie was found -- a neurological disease that can affect goats.

The CFIA had already slaughtered 482 goats from the farm, and now they planned to kill Sunshine, too.  

Even though Sunshine’s risk of scrapie is almost zero, and even though he lives at a sanctuary, the CFIA insisted that killing Sunshine was the only way to protect the goat farming industry. But Sunshine is more than just "livestock." He is a pet goat and part of the Piebird sanctuary family. Sherry and Yan vowed to fight the CFIA decision.

Lawyers from Animal Justice were there to help. We stepped in, determined not to let Sunshine become a casualty of the CFIA’s harsh eradication program. And we won.

Thanks to Animal Justice lawyers, Sherry and Yan, and the momentum of a 30,000+ person petition supporting Sunshine, the CFIA backed down. Sunshine was saved from a cruel death. Today, he continues to live a joyful life with Sherry, Yan, and the rest of the rescued creatures who call Piebird Sanctuary their home.

Read more: CFIA puts rare Shropshire sheep on death row; now on the lam; CFIA returns to farm; charges laid; the fight to save Sunshine the goat from CFIA-ordered slaughter

December 3, 2016 update: Justice Laura Bird stayed the charges against Jones and Schmidt this week. She agreed with their lawyer that the delay in bringing the case to trial was unreasonable. Bird wrote in her ruling that "the applicants have established on a balance of probabilities that their right to be tried within a reasonable time ... has been infringed." (Source: The Canadian Press)

Read more: CFIA puts rare Shropshire sheep on death row; now on the lam; CFIA returns to farm; charges laid; charges stayed 2016; the fight to save Sunshine the goat from CFIA-ordered slaughter

Support the Right to Rescue Help the whistleblowers facing prison time for exposing factory farm abuses and rescuing suffering animals.

World Day for Farmed Animals was launched in 1983, and takes place on or about October 2nd. Get active. Sacrificing moral values on the altar of economic gain.