A Visual Reminder of What Happens to Cattle

If you eat beef from most places in America -- fast food, regular restaurants, regular grocery stores -- it probably came from an animal that ended its days somewhere like this:


This satellite photo is from a set of images by artist Mishka Henner. More where that came from.

Jason Kottke featured the image today and said this about it:

From artist Mishka Henner, a selection of satellite photos of Texas feedlots, where beef cattle are sent to be "finished", aka to quickly gain weight for slaughter on a diet of corn. I'm pretty sure the redness of that pit/lake is not blood but algae (or whatever), but it sure creates that impression, doesn't it?

I wrote about my brief encounter with these types of feedlots, called CAFOs (controlled animal feeding operations), back in 2010. Their fenced borders are generally marked with signs like these:


But even big agriculture can't keep the satellites out.