notes

Have you ever seen a slaughterhouse? Chances are there's one close to where you live. Or take a road trip and visit a fur farm or a company that sells animals to laboratories. When you do, send us pictures and we'll post them here. Help us to improve this resource. Let us know if you find businesses that have closed, incorrect addresses, or if there's something missing from our lists.

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Featured: The bad and the ugly

Each month Final Nail.com will take a close look at one business or an industry segment from our website.

January 2012:

Before you purchase the new issue of Comics Buyer's Guide, Writer's Digest or Popular Woodworking, you may want to think about where your money is going. Cincinnati-based F+W Media is the publisher of these and many other special-interest magazines. The company is also responsible for Trapper & Predator Caller, which for over 35 years has provided instruction on how to trap and kill animals. With F+W Media publications, we recommend browsing not buying at the newsstand.

December 2011:

You may not expect to find a by-product of the cruel fur industry in the shoe department at Walmart or Target, but leather care products made out of mink oil are common at large retail stores. (Less common but equally problematic are skin care products made from mink oil.) As its name suggests, mink oil comes from animals killed in fur farms (the oil is made from fat found under the skin of mink). Mink oil products are definitely on Final Nail's "do not buy" list!

November:

For November, we focus on Marshall BioResources (commonly known as Marshall Farms), an international company based in New York that breeds thousands of dogs, ferrets and pigs for use in research laboratories each year. The company is currently the target of protests by activists in Italy and the UK who are fighting to close beagle breeding facilities operated by Marshall in those countries.

Unless you're a vivisector, you'll likely never purchase an animal from Marshall BioResources, but you may be unknowingly supporting this disgusting company when you visit PetSmart, Petco or similar retailers. A sister company called Marshall Pet Products is the largest breeder of ferrets for the pet trade in the U.S. The company also sells food, litter, collars, harnesses, toys, shampoo and other products for ferrets. In addition, Marshall Pet Products sells products under other brands-- including odor control products under the name "GoodBye Odor," skin and coat care products under the "Earth's Balance" name, treats and other products for rabbits under the name "Peter's" and treats for horses under the name "Orchard Sweets."

Don't support Marshall Farms! Adopt, don't buy ferrets from pet stores. If you see the Marshall Pet Products logo on a product when shopping, try to find an alternative. You may also want to ask the store not to stock Marshall products.

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Information wanted. You can help

Final Nail.com needs your help investigating the status of farms, and to fill in the blanks about other businesses listed on our website.

Check back for new questions.

January 2012:

Myrtle's Rabbitry, in Thompson's Station, Tennessee (outside Nashville) is one of the largest suppliers of rabbits to research and testing labs in the United States. Thousands of rabbits are caged inside large barns at the property. In June 2011, Covance Research Products announced that it had purchased Myrtle's "breeders and stock." Can you help us determine if Myrtle's Rabbitry is still in operation?

December 2011:

The Saint Joe River Valley in northern Idaho is beautiful, but near the shores of Round Lake is an ugly company that specializes in supplying "non-traditional" animals to research laboratories. Northeastern Wildlife (4825 E. Holiday Road, Harrison, ID 83833), boasts on its website that it has sent thousands of woodchucks to their deaths in labs worldwide. The company sells both captive-born and wild-caught woodchucks, as well as wild-caught opossums and other animals (Northeastern Wildlife also provides contract research services). We're curious what a woodchuck farm looks like. If you live in eastern Washington/northern Idaho, we encourage you to consider a trip to the town of Harrison. If you do, please send us pictures of what you discover!

November:

There are several states, like Georgia or Massachusetts, that at one time had very large mink farms, but now (as far as we know) have none. Can you help us determine if New Hampshire and Maryland can be added to the fur-farm-free list? Both states reportedly only have one mink farm-- the Parsons Mink Ranch in Salisbury, Maryland and Richard Gauthier's mink and fox farm in Lyndeborough, New Hampshire. Do you live near these farms? We need your help to determine whether or not they are still in business.

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