8-Foot Tall Piles of Manure at Egg Farms

And you thought you didn’t want to know how the sausage was made: Manure piled eight feet high, dead maggots squishing underfoot, and live mice and birds were found inside the massive Iowa egg farms thought to be responsible for the nationwide outbreak of salmonella. Federal investigators inspected Wright County Egg and Hillandale Farms, which together have had to recall 500 million eggs in less than a month, and found several instances of unsanitary conditions. The salmonella bacterium is found in the feces of mice, birds, and other animals. The Food and Drug Administration found buildings to have holes or gaps in their walls, which make infiltration by pests easy. One hen house’s walls were warped by manure. The FDA said the two farms—which it had never inspected before—looked to be in violation of egg safety regulations that have been in place since July 9, as well as industry standards. Wright County Egg promised to fix the problems by mid-September.