The Bear Bile Farming Industry

This story exposes the horror of bear bile farms.

My intent is to open your eyes to brutality and suffering of bears. My story is not to convince anyone to go vegan or vegetarian. My goal is to help spur a movement to encourage an alternative to bile by using herbs.

Asiatic black bears, sun bears, moon bears and brown bears are commonly found on bear farms. Bile farms can be found in China, South Korea, Laos, Vietnam and Myanmar. China has some breeding programs, but they also rely on poaching.

Video (Nov 4, 2011): Vile farming for bear bile – “All across Asia, bear bile is in demand by traditional Chinese medicine shops. In countries that farm the bile, mainly China, Vietnam, Korea and Lao, bears are kept inhumanely, in cages that match their size and so offers no room for movement.”

“Moon Bear” Video published on Sep 13, 2012 – “Watch the hard-hitting, undercover documentary showing the brutality of the bear bile industry across China, which recently won a top award at the Fifth China Ya’an International Panda, Animals and Nature Film Week. The documentary was made by three independent film-makers who devoted four years to its production, visiting small and large bear bile farms, revealing “legal” farms with conditions that are clearly breaking current regulations for such farms in China.”

Most bears are captured through poaching. If a snared bear is not used for a bile farm it is killed for parts such as gall bladders for medicines and aphrodisiacs, paws used for soup; teeth and claws are used for souvenirs and jewelry.

If the bear is female with cubs she is killed and her cubs are taken to farm. Some captured bears suffer from bile extraction for 20-30 years.

Milking bears is cruel. Extraction involves inserting a catheter into the gall bladder that allows bile to drip. On average they are milked 2-3 times per day.

Most farmed bears are starved, dehydrated and suffer from disease. Often infections and malignant tumors are what kills them.

Wikipedia – Bile bears, sometimes called battery bears, are bears kept in captivity to harvest their bile, a digestive fluid produced by the liver and stored in the gallbladder, which is used by some traditional Chinese medicine practitioners

Most bears are de-toothed meaning teeth are cruelly ripped from their socket. If not de-toothed most of them to have few teeth from biting on the bars in an attempt to escape or out of boredom. Warn down teeth can create raw and exposed nerves.

Some of them are declawed which is an amputation procedure. It removes the claw and supporting bone.

They are kept in are small cages. Some are so small the bear cannot turn around. They have nothing but iron bars to stand on.

PSA: Life Sentence Behind Bars at a Bear Bile Farm

Bear farming in Korea: “Today in Korea, nearly 1600 bears are raised and kept in farms, forced to live in unnaturally cramped and squalid conditions, where they are “milked” for bile and slaughtered for body parts. The number of bears held captive in farms is a stark and pitiful contrast to wild moon bears in Korea, which are all but extinct.”
National Geographic: Inside the Disturbing World of Bear-Bile Farming – National Geographic got an inside look at activists from Free the Bears, an Australia-based organization, rescuing bears in Laos from the bile and pet trades, as well as from poachers seeking to kill the animals to sell their claws and other body parts.
Animals Asia: End Bear Bile Farming – Most farmed bears are kept permanently in cages, sometimes so small that they are unable to turn around or stand on all fours. Some bears are caged as cubs and never released, with many kept caged for up to 30 years. Most farmed bears are starved and dehydrated, and suffer from multiple diseases and malignant tumours that ultimately kill them.

Thanks to undercover videos filmed by rescue groups many animals have been rescued from unnatural, unbearable and torturous environments that use cruel methods of farming. Many groups are fighting to save bears and end the cruelty of bile farms.

What Happens to Bears After They’re Rescued From Bile Farming? (MAY 10, 2017) – Over the past couple months, Animals Asia has been working with the government’s Forest Protection Department to figure out how they can realistically end bear bile farming by 2020. The two sides hope to sign a memorandum of understanding in the coming weeks. According to Tuan Bendixsen, the director of Animals Asia in Vietnam, part of the plan involves Animals Asia helping to improve government-run animal-rescue centers that take in wild animals like turtles and pangolins but lack the infrastructure and technical know-how to care for bears.

It is within our power to choose kindness over cruelty. There is something we all can do. We can support organizations on the front lines, we can become activists, we can contact legislators or sign petitions.

Thanks for caring!

Pledge made to reduce use of endangered wildlife in medicinal products – In an effort to reduce the demand for wildlife-based medicinal products involving endangered animals, traditional Chinese medicine practitioners in Malaysia made a pledge on Sunday to use sustainable substitutes to bear bile.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWpZpkBtXgQ