Mink Farm Raid

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

On Aug. 30, farmer Brad Roesler sent the following letter to the editors of local media:

In spite of many and diverse opinions regarding the farming of mink, a community has come together in the face of the eco-terrorist attack by the Animal Liberation Front on our Sultan mink farm.

It is with humble and grateful hearts that we express our thanks to our families, employees, our friends and neighbors, for love, prayer, support and the exhausting physical labor involved in this effort to recover the "freed" mink. To those who daily brought to the farm, food and cold drinks on these hot summer days, we are sincerely grateful. We thank you for the many phone calls pinpointing the location of animals and the many expressions of understanding and sympathy for the farm, with the outrage expressed at the inhumane and unconscionable and unjustifiable action of the perpetrators of this atrocity.

To those whose personal property has been violated and destroyed by the Animal Liberation Front and the "freed" mink as they seek shelter, food and water, we earnestly apologize.

To those responsible for this violence, the one good thing you have accomplished is to unite this home-town community and solidify its citizens in the resolve that this kind of violence will not be tolerated.

Those who have rendered help and support are too numerous to list. We know who each and everyone of you are, and we will not soon forget your generosity of spirit.

In sincere appreciation.

Brad and Kate Roesler
Jeff Roesler
The extended Roesler Family
Sultan.

Update from the Farm: Day Three

Aug. 27: The Roesler family and over a hundred volunteers worked all day recovering mink, no longer by the dozens, but by ones and twos.

"We've got one - or two - in our garage," reported one caller after another. One woman ran out to the store to buy tunafish and held three in her backyard over night until someone could get out to pick them up Tuesday a.m.

Chicken farmers in the area reported mink attacking their flocks and losses to the chicken farmers were high. Local Highway 2 took it's toll, as did neighborhood dogs. Mink continued to find their way back to the farm but they were in bad shape, dehydrated and starving.

Two shifts, early and late, ran volunteers of 50 each, collecting mink, sorting them, and bedding them down. The farm workers sorted mink by sex, matching up two female mink with a male mink before putting them in a pen. The mink usually share pens with their litter mates while young and don't like bunking with strangers. If incorrectly paired up after being released and abandoned like this herd on Monday morning, they will fight and kill each other.

By 5 p.m., the Roesler family reported they'd collected about 80% of those let loose on Monday morning but still hadn't taken time to get a firm count.

FUR COMMISSION USA PRESS RELEASE, AUGUST 26, 2003
(See also Turning adversity around; Eco-terror target turns political activist. By Kate Roesler for the Snohomish County Farm Bureau News Letter, March 2004)

Washington Fur Farm Raided by ALF
Reward Offered to Bring Terrorists to Justice

A substantial reward is being offered for information leading to the conviction of ecoterrorists who struck a mink farm in Snohomish County, Washington, early yesterday.

Some time between midnight and 4 a.m., from 10,000 to 12,000 domesticated mink were released from their pens and abandoned at Roesler Brothers Fur Farm in Sultan. Although almost all of the farm's pens were opened, the remainder of the 22,000 mink on the farm stayed put.

Guilt for the crime was claimed later the same day by the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) terrorist group, in an e-mail to local media. (1)

A reward of up to $100,000 is being offered by Fur Commission USA, which represents mink farmers in 28 states, for information leading to the arrest and conviction of those involved. (See below for contact information.) Anyone finding a lost mink is also asked to call FCUSA, and to exercise caution, since the animal will be scared, hungry and thirsty, and might bite.

"Small Army" of Helpers

Along with about 50 neighbors, farmers and retired farmers, Frank Candelario of American Legend Cooperative and Doug Kelly of the American Mink Council, the marketing cooperatives of North American mink farmers, worked side by side catching mink as temperatures reached almost 90 degrees. "It was intense," said Candelario. "I was very impressed with everyone working hard." The goal, he said, was to get the mink into their pens "with a healthy dose of feed, and then to get them calmed down and into their routine."

The "small army of people" caught mink in the thick, brushy trees and on the farm while paramedics helped the workers deal with cuts and bites.

Another crew worked cleaning pens of the old feed since the mink had been let out and abandoned before they'd been given their fresh feed that morning. Yet more neighbors brought food and drinks to fuel the crews.

Brothers Brad and Jeff Roesler run the farm along with their families, raising mink for use in cold-weather clothing, oils and other products. "I got people helping catch mink that I don't even know," said Brad, visibly moved by the kindness of his neighbors.

By nightfall, 60 to 70% of the traumatized mink had been recovered and bedded down, allowing farm workers to take their first breath of the day. However, the numbers were hard to confirm since the workers were too busy to stop and count.

On the morning of Aug. 26, the recovery effort resumed, while individual mink were seen returning to the farm on their own, desperate for food and water. A slight rain helped cool down the early part of the day, but the weather warmed up at noon, making it more likely that mink still out in the woods would succumb to thirst and dehydration.

Neighbors continued to assist the farmers, with 8- to 10-year-olds mastering the loop snare and lassoing mink. An elderly woman apologized for not being "any good at catching mink," but brought a freshly baked pie instead!

Becky Demuth, a mink farmer in Iowa, called to offer her support to the farming families. It was almost exactly a year ago that the Demuth farm experienced its own attack by ecoterrorists.

"No matter how bad one of these attacks is on a farm, they always restore my confidence in people," said FCUSA's executive director, Teresa Platt. "The neighbors have been wonderful helpers at saving this farm and we thank them." Roesler family members echoed Platt's sentiments, calling their neighbors "amazing" and "fabulous".

Yet even those mink which are returned to the safety of the farm are still at risk. "We're still losing them due to trauma" caused by the stress of being released and abandoned, explained one family member. Every effort is being made to ensure a high survival rate, but the next 24 hours will be critical.

Damage Estimate

Using past attacks on mink farms as a guide, an initial estimate of the damage has been put at $500,000. Explained Teresa Platt to the Seattle Times, this includes the loss of genetic history for the animals and the fact that the farm raises the coveted blue mink, which have a higher value than standard black or brown mink.

The latest terrorist strike continues an expensive month for the West. On Aug. 1, an arson attack on a San Diego apartment construction site caused $50 million in damages. This was followed on Aug. 21 by a $1 million arson at an automobile dealership in West Covina, Los Angeles. And on Aug. 28, two bombs exploded at biotech company Chiron Corp. in Emeryville.

"Obviously eco-terrorists are on a road trip doing damage in Western States," said Platt. "We urge people to stay alert. Everyone who relies on the Earth and its animals to live is a potential target. That's all of us."

Notes:

(1) Following is the message received by local media. Fur Commission USA is not acquainted with any "Mink Rehabilitation Project". An accurate picture of how domesticated mink fare in the wild is presented in a National Public Radio report on a 1998 fur farm raid in Michigan. (RealPlayer required)

Bite Back magazine ( www.directaction.info <http://www.directaction.info> ) has received the following anonymous communique from the Animal Liberation Front (A.L.F.):

"The Animal Liberation Front is claiming responsibility for the liberation of 10,000 mink from a Sultan fur farm (339th Ave SE - dirt road east of landing strip). Fencing was removed and nearly every cage opened. It has been shown through such efforts as the Mink Rehabilitation Project that farm raised mink can survive and flourish in the wild. All industry responses stating the contrary are lies. All institutions of animal exploitation - regardless of any attempts to conceal their bloody operations - will be located and the animals liberated.
A.L.F."

See also:.

"Mink release prompts Stevens Bill," Daily Herald (WA), Jan. 14, 2004.

"News update: Most minks back on the farm," Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Oct. 2, 2003.

"Farm's escaped minks still running wild," Seattle Times, Sept. 17, 2003.

"Mink stolen," Las Vegas Review-Journal editorial, Sept. 2, 2003.

"That touch of mink. That's also a crime," Seattle Times editorial Aug. 31, 2003.

"Eco-terrorists do most harm to their own cause," Daily Herald (WA) editorial, Aug. 28, 2003.

"Mink farmers focus on security," Daily Herald (WA), Aug. 27, 2003.

"Farmers on edge after mink releases; damage estimated at $500,000," Seattle Times, Aug. 27, 2003.

"10,000 mink released from Sultan farm cages," Seattle Times, Aug. 26, 2003.

"Sultan farm minks released. Someone cut the farm's fences and set free thousands of the animals in what investigators consider an act of eco-terrorism," Daily Herald (WA), Aug. 26, 2003.

Resources:.

FCUSA Press Kit Special Feature: Safe Farms Campaign

FCUSA chronology of animal extremist / eco-terrorist crimes

For further information contact: Teresa Platt, Executive Director, Fur Commission USA, PMB 506, 826 Orange Avenue, Coronado, CA 92118-2698 USA, (619) 575-0139, (619) 575-5578/fax, furfarmers@aol.com, www.furcommission.com.

To take a cyber-tour of a fur farm, visit Fur Commission USA's Fur on Film at http://www.furcommission.com/video/index.htm

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