New Video Reveals Miserable Lives, Horrific Deaths of Minks on Wisconsin Fur Farm

PETA Calls for Criminal Investigation After Eyewitness Footage Shows Animals Warehoused in Wire Cages, Gassed en Masse in Makeshift Machine

For Immediate Release:
January 12, 2016

Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382

As just reported by the Green Bay Press Gazette, a two-month PETA eyewitness exposé of Dillenburg Fur Farm, LLC, in Shawano County shows that workers grabbed terrified, screaming minks by their sensitive tails and stuffed as many as 30 of them at a time into a metal drum with carbon monoxide crudely pumped in by a running engine in order to gas them to death. PETA has submitted a request for a criminal investigation to local law enforcement.

PETA’s video highlights numerous abuses at the fur farm, where approximately 2,500 minks and 100 foxes were kept in rows of filthy, wire-floored cages above foot-high piles of their own waste until they were slaughtered. One mink who survived a mass gassing had her neck broken by the farmer, while another survived the gassing for more than 20 minutes before finally dying.

Cages were sprayed with a high-pressure washer while minks were inside because, as the owner’s wife said, “If those mink are stained and dirty, I’m losing 10, 20 dollars a mink on that.” The loud pressure-washer engine caused minks to circle, jump, and pace wildly. One mink attempted to chew through a cage until her face was bloody; she received no treatment for her injuries. One fox had obviously swollen gums—the farmer said that the fox had refused to breed, and he graphically bragged about how he’d “jacked” him.

Many minks and foxes—slated to be bred and/or killed next year—remain at Dillenburg Fur Farm. In 2014, nearly 1.27 million minks were pelted in Wisconsin, the top mink-producing state.

“Minks are solitary individuals who love to swim in their vast marshland homes, but on this fur farm, they were warehoused one right next to the other in tiny wire cages until they were gassed to death,” says PETA Senior Vice President Daphna Nachminovitch. “PETA is calling on shoppers around the world to condemn this cruelty and refuse to buy any fur.”

Photographs from the investigation are available here, and broadcast-quality video footage is available here. For more information, please visit PETA.org.