Mercy for Animals

13 Undercover Investigations Scarier Than a Horror Film. Mercy for Animals.

October is the month to enjoy horror movies, go through haunted corn mazes, and get chills reading about ghost encounters. While these make for some fun times, you can always remind yourself that they are not real. For farmed animals, however, blood, guts, and fear are the horrific reality every single day. Mercy For Animals’ brave undercover investigators and whistleblowers have conducted more than 60 investigations and exposés inside factory farms and slaughterhouses to expose the public to the truth.

Here are 13 MFA investigations and exposés that are scarier than any horror film you could watch.


1. Lilydale

Footage obtained by MFA found workers at several Lilydale chicken suppliers ripping off the heads and legs of live chickens; violently jamming birds into overcrowded transport crates; running over live birds with forklifts; and hitting, kicking, and throwing chickens.


2. McDonald’s Chicken McNuggets

The 2015 investigation at a McDonald’s chicken supplier exposed horrific cruelty to animals, including birds beaten, crowded in filthy sheds, stabbed to death with nails attached to makeshift clubs, and left to suffer and slowly die without proper veterinary care.


3. Andrus Farms

At Andrus Farms, a supplier to one of the largest cheese producers in the world, the investigator documented workers viciously beating, stabbing, and dragging sick and injured cows.


4. Leprino Foods Supplier

This investigation at Winchester Dairy, a supplier to major pizza cheese producer Leprino Foods, caught workers viciously kicking and punching cows, stabbing cows with screwdrivers, and violently whipping them with metal chains and wires.


5. Walmart Supplier

A 2013 undercover investigation exposed routine and sadistic animal abuse at a Tyson factory farm that supplied pork to Walmart. An investigator documented workers kicking, punching, and throwing pigs. Workers also gouged the eyes of mother pigs.


6. Catfish Corner

A startling glimpse into a fish slaughter facility in Mesquite, Texas, found fish suffocated, skinned, and dismembered while conscious and able to feel pain.


7. E6 Cattle Co.

This heartbreaking undercover investigation found workers bludgeoning calves’ heads with pickaxes and hammers (often five or six times before rendering the animals unconscious), beaten calves—still alive and conscious—thrown onto piles of dead animals, and workers kicking downed calves in the head and standing on their necks and ribs.


8. Butterball

In 2014 an MFA undercover investigator captured video footage of baby turkeys routinely mutilated without painkillers; ground up alive in macerating machines; and carelessly thrown, dropped, and mishandled.


9. Tyson Foods

Workers for Tyson Foods, a major chicken supplier to McDonald’s, KFC, Chick-fil-A, and more, were documented punching, throwing, and beating birds. The undercover investigation also found birds having their heads ripped off while still alive.


10. Mexico’s Government-Owned Slaughterhouses

An MFA investigation at government-owned slaughterhouses in Mexico documented egregious animal abuse, including terrified animals hooked in the mouth, stabbed in the neck, and bludgeoned to death with metal pipes—all while they were still conscious and able to feel pain.


11. Lilydale Turkey Supplier

The disturbing hidden-camera video revealed birds painfully shackled upside down, shocked with electricity, cut open while still conscious, and scalded to death in hot water tanks at a turkey slaughterhouse owned by Lilydale—one of the largest poultry producers in Canada.


12. Bettencourt Dairies

MFA’s investigation into Bettencourt Dairies, a major cheese supplier in Idaho, led to criminal animal cruelty charges for three workers, including the manager of the dairy. Hidden cameras captured workers—including management—viciously beating and shocking cows and violently twisting their tails to deliberately inflict pain; workers and management repeatedly shocking a downed cow and then dragging her by the neck using a chain attached to a tractor; extremely unsafe and unsanitary conditions, including feces-covered floors that caused cows to regularly slip, fall, and injure themselves; and sick or injured cows suffering from open wounds, broken bones, and infected udders left to suffer without veterinary care.


13. Maple Lodge Farms

Shocking hidden-camera footage recorded by an MFA whistleblower at a hatchery owned by Maple Lodge Farms exposed baby chicks ground up alive, roughly dropped onto machines, viciously killed by having their necks smashed against metal edges of factory equipment, and dumped into baskets and left to suffer for hours before death.

So while we may be enjoying tricks and scares, for animals at factory farms, the horror and the gore are real.

To help stop this nightmare from continuing, support our work and become an Investigator Ally today.

And remember: Leaving animals off your plate is the best thing you can do to end the atrocities animals face. Try a compassionate vegan lifestyle.