The COVID-19 pandemic has led farmers to some excruciating decisions to cut their losses, including euthanizing animals.

There’s a financial toll, for sure, but an emotional one as well. 

“They’re cringing,” says Lyda Garcia, an assistant professor of meat science with Ohio State University College of Food, Agricultural and Environmental Sciences (CFAES). “It really hurts to have to do that.”

Related: Complete coronavirus coverage

With meat processing plants partially or fully closed or backed up with orders, some Ohio farmers who raise pigs and chickens for slaughter are reluctantly turning to reducing their flocks or herds.

It’s not a decision they want to make, nor a decision they ever expected to make, according to Garcia.

This is happening amid other hurdles. Commodity prices continue to sink, and just last year, many Midwest farmers could not plant corn or soybeans because of unprecedented rainfall. For some farmers, knowing options to stay financially sound is as important as knowing how to get help for anxiety and emotional slumps.

“The way we explain it is that taking care of yourself, including your mental health, is like changing the oil on your tractor,” says Sarah Noggle, an educator with CFAES’ OSU Extension outreach arm in Paulding County. “If you don’t do it routinely, things become unbalanced.”

And there are many reasons for imbalances now.

Blockage in industry

In the meat industry, COVID-19 has led to a logjam. Though livestock raised on the farm is ready for market, many meat processors are unable to accept it — at least not at the same pace they were able to before the coronavirus arrived in the United States. The pandemic has led to a lot of sickness and time off work at processing plants; and though the nation’s major plants are opening up, shifts are limited.

Ohio has about 400 smaller meat and poultry processing plants, but most have a backlog of orders — some of which are typically funneled to the nation’s largest plants out of state, Garcia explains. About 25% of Ohio’s pigs are processed out of state, and trying to find an Ohio meat processor to take them is challenging.

Farmers in Ohio have been forced to euthanize some pigs and chickens, primarily because the animals can’t be held on the farm long after they reach market weight without declining seriously in value or losing value entirely, Garcia says.

“The farmers are really upset, because this is what they devote their lives to,” Garcia adds. “It’s happening frequently enough that many of us are gathering resources for farmers on mental health. This is serious.”

Keeping pigs and chickens on a farm for longer times means they’ll weigh more when they’re sold. But sometimes a processor won’t buy an animal if it’s too large, or the processor will pay the farmer a lot less for the animal because the additional fat could mean it sells for less.

Typically, cattle can be kept a bit longer on the farm after they reach market size and still be OK for sale. But if cattle producers have to seek out a smaller processor instead of a major one, they often earn less for that meat, Garcia says.

The bottom line

“At the end of the day, it’s all about losing money,” she says.

Most often, farmers with hogs and chickens are eliminating the youngest or unborn in their flocks or herds, rather than the fully grown animals in which they have already invested.

Farmers can’t easily donate their livestock to a food bank because it has to be taken to a meat processor, and the processors are backed up with orders for the next six months to a year, Garcia says.

“The farmers have plenty of animals, but nowhere to take them.”

For information on mental health resources, visit OSU mental health resource guides and OSU farm assistance OSU farm assistance.

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