Eastern Shore Sanctuary Blog

Every day on the Delmarva peninsula, more than a million birds scream, scratch and flap as they are shackled to the machinery of death. The center of it all is Salisbury, Maryland — home of the late Frank Perdue, who was the first to apply the industrial model now known as “factory farming” to chickens raised for meat.

Business Route 50 runs right through Salisbury, passing Perdue’s first slaughter factory on the way. The factory’s deadly disassembly line runs all day every day. If you stand at the intersection of Cypress Street and W. Salisbury Boulevard long enough, you’ll see the trucks loaded with young birds arriving to offload their live but soon-to-be-dead cargo.

On Saturday, 4 October, in honor of World Farmed Animals Day, animal advocates will stand there long enough to see. FARM and the Eastern Shore Sanctuary, along with other organizations, will stand vigil in front of the slaughterhouse from 4:00 to 7:00 P.M.

Join us if you can. Carpools and ride-shares are available from Baltimore and DC. Visit http://www.wfad.org/Alerts/vigil8.htm for details. To find a World Farmed Animals Day event near you, visit the WFAD Action Center.

Standing witness to suffering is hard work that can have lingering repercussions. Animal advocates often withstand nightmares, insomnia, depression, and what feels like unbearable anger as a result of their work. The Eastern Shore Sanctuary now has a limited number of copies of sanctuary founder pattrice jones’ handbook for activists, Aftershock: Confronting Trauma in a Violent World, which offers practical tips on dealing with stress, grief, and despair. The book can be purchased to support the sanctuary. Write to us at sanctuary (at) bravebirds.org to find out how to get your own signed copy with the personal inscription of your choice.