condemned Photo | TrekEarth

Photographer’s Note

NB : Just realised that the end of the Ramadan is near : in advance, happy Eid ul Fitr to all our Muslim friends ; this does not apply to the all the sheep who are grazing happily and freely accompanied by their shepherds in the wild, but about the big farms in Europe etc.

Staying recently for a couple of nights in a small village having 3 farms still working, I had the chance to enter in some of the departments of the largest one (more than 500 ha, exploited by 3 brothers and their father) - I learned so much but we had entered secretely : "this is not a show", had told one of the farmers to the neighbouring family who hosted me.

These young bulls who are kept inside for safety reasons are hybrids and will be slaughtered in a few days - I have been a vegetarian for more than 30 years but I'm not a fanatic defender of the animal rights, nor do I like to express too much sensitivity or strong feelings about this ;

... Still, now that we talk so much of environment and sustainability, more and more are telling that it would be much better if less meat was consumed in the world, as these animals need sooo much cereals and water to grow, these cereals taking a good part of the exploited land (and more water) only to feed the cattle instead of the humans.

In another giant building adjacent to this one, the cows who were grazing in the rich pastures nearby were being milked 2 times a day ; it's more advantageous to raise cows (who are not hybrids, but all of the same Dutch origin plus some ideal combination of other species) ; unfortunately for these rich and hard-working farmers, there is a milk quota that prevents them to get even more cows.

(NB : not really my prefered subject but I thought it was interesting too, and why not changing sometimes ?)

thea0211, Vasa, tomescuc, zmey, faubry has marked this note useful

Critiques | Translate

thea0211 (1355) 2008-09-29 9:08

dear cath,
don't worry about change. change is good.
(but it takes guts ;o) and not everybody has that)

... good perspective, good eye lead. a lot of straight lines, order and discipline. and some well cared for life forms on the left. waiting. and you even established eye contact ;o) so ... they are quite receptive. unfortunately those are the kind of looks that might stay with you now that you know they will be slaughtered (doesn't matter why)

you know ... maybe if we weren't where we are in the "food chain" we could be the ones photographed and felt sorry for.
oh, of course that is highly impossible, nonsense, what are you talking about (again), dora? ... most would say?
but do we know for sure? do we know anything for sure?

i'm not a vegetarian and i am not fighting for animal's rights either but ... i think.

so thank you for changing subjects from time to time and for making us think.

dora

Vasa (6691) 2008-09-29 9:31

Chere Catherine,

tu travailles bien avec des nouvelles images, cette fois-ci avec ton inspiration de la France. Je te reviendarai avec plus d'attention, des que je me retrouve moi-meme: chaque fois que je rentre a la maison, je trouve ma galerie decimee. Et, je reposte, je reposte, je ne caisse pas de reposter toujours la meme photo. Merci de ton soutien, je reste la, a admirer ton travail,

Branko

MarcT (21105) 2008-09-29 12:05

Salut Cath,
Joli portrait bovin. Faut croire que tu intriguait l'animal ;o))
Amitiés
Marc

lestans (15550) 2008-09-29 12:32

Ciao Cath!!

belli i tori che ci guardano! E interessante il soggetto di questa stalla. Ottima la prospettiva

Livia

tomescuc (2837) 2008-09-29 13:23

Bonjour Catherine,
Yes, I like the perspective and lines. A clean image, just enough color saturation. The looks on those bovines underlie your point, worry, uncertainty about their fate, helplessness. yes, it is troubling, of course. But tonight I may forget it all and enjoy my steak. life goes on ...
amicalement,
Cristian

jasmis (51339) 2008-09-30 1:02

Smart photo. I like cows, these are very useful animals.

Regards my dear friend.

zmey (7282) 2008-09-30 6:54

hello catherine
i like the extreme mmmm-oooo closeup. an interesting topic too... less meat you say? maybe... have you read about the encounterrs between gengiz-khan's mongol warriors and the chinese armies? in the age of hand-to-hand combat, the mongols found chinese to be easily defeatable for they were physically inferior to the mongols (much smaller and weaker). the reason for the physical differences was diet. chinese recruits were almost exclusively vegetarian, while the mongols were almost exclusively carnivorius... :))

regards,
kristaps

ps. in my not so humble opinion, the world simply has already exceeded it's limit of naturally supportable number of human beings living with dignity and in harmony with their surroundings... unfortunately, the highest population growth in the world is occuring exactly in places which are the least suited for feeding MORE humans... exponential population growth means resources would be exhausted very fast no matter: would we turn vegetarian or stay omnivorous.

Polonaise (5638) 2008-09-30 14:44

The great thing upon coming to your site Cathy, is - that there always something learn.
If not in the photography field - for sure there will be some other fields to explore...
Today...
The global population !!!!
Loooove meat ( but fish even better !)...

Scare perspective for over populating our beloved one ?
No... Not really...Not yet !
Not in our times - thanks God :-)))

The biggest problem ?
I think - Africa 1
Yes... Africa is the biggest problem and we don't know how to deal with it

The rate of birth in there, the malnutrition of the children, starvation, AIDS, constant conflicts of the most primitive sort of, etc...etc...

Yet (on the positive note) - I believe in the somehow logical wisdom (???) of the earth residents...
In other terms - I'm happy go lucky fella who believes that everything has some sense and it will balance itself in the end (possibly - the highest level of debilism found in somehow normal individual ??)
There is enough food for (roughly) - 5o-70 billion people on earth - plenty of food that is.
There are gigantic territoires ready to produce food and waiting... (USA,Canada, Australia,Brazil, Argentina, Ukraine, big parts of Russia - to name just a few.
Also: Unlimited resources of the (potentially) biggest food producers in the world - Africa !

Unfortunately - it's potentially only.
Because that will require to relocate the Africans(mere - two billions of them) into the other parts of the globe (Antarctica ?) and the rest of the civilized world - move in there ! :-)))

God - forgive me my sinful thoughts :-)))

In the meantime - Cath...
Watch me eating my delicious steak with broccoli and onions and potatoes and a glass of golden beer, or blood reddish wine...

cheers

..................

Cuuuuute fotka :-)))

g
..........

PS: Miriam Makeba stays in there, in Africa !

marietom (32294) 2008-10-01 7:12

salut Cath,

Quelle compo, géniale ! Ce bestiau a bien envie de sortir te voir... par contre, je ne suis pas allée au bout de ta note en anglais...
Bonne soirée
Marie

faubry (32521) 2008-10-02 0:29

bonsoir Cath, je n avais pas fait attention a cette photo, je trouve interesant ce cadrage serre,son regard curieux vers toi.. heureusement pour elle, elle n est pas choIsie pour les fetes de l Eid.. la nourriture est mal repartie, trop chez nous, pas assez en Afrique en effet, plus d eau dans le desert mais comme tu le dis si bien
ces gens d Afrique,malgre tout, sont gais, dansent, rient et nous donnent souvent des lecons, enfin a moi,.
Chez nous tout est reglemente, pas le droit de depasser tant d herbage, de litres de lait etc..
j imagine mal le fait de deplacer les africains en Arctique comme le suggere George.. je rigole bien entendu,
tu as raison c est bien de changer de style de temps en temps, pour ne pas rester enferme dans un moule.
a bientot
bises
francine