CAS films cruel festival ‘Bull to the Sea’ (Bous a la Mar)

02-08-2022

CAS International and AnimaNaturalis recently filmed the bull festival ‘Bull to de Sea’ (Bous a la Mar) in Spain. For the past two years, fewer bull festivals have taken place in the southern European country due to covid-19 restrictions. However, this year the bull festivals return without restrictions. Therefore, we can once again take new images of this kind of events and show them to the world. Sign the petition so we can put an end to cruel bull festivals.

Bull to the Sea

In Denia (Valencia) the annual bull festival Bous a la Mar takes place. During this event, participants force bulls and cows to jump into the sea. This is not done gently, and we wanted to capture that. The animals are treated brutally. Once in the sea, the animals are tied to a boat with a rope and then brought back to the quay. The participants sit on their horns, while the animals struggle to keep their heads above water. For the animals, this is enormously stressful and frightening: water instinctively feels like a threat. In addition, they have never had to deal with water before, which is an unknown element for them. It happens that bulls and cows drown during these events.

We have, together with @AnimaNaturalis, documented the cruel event Bous a la Mar, in which bulls and cows are forced to jump in the sea. Please sign out petition to stop the cruel fiestas in Spain: https://t.co/voiIkjgUFd https://t.co/tlxJRq6KJO

— CAS International (@CAS_Int) July 18, 2022

Between July 9 and 17, the municipality of Denia organized Bous a la Mar 16 times. In the end, 96 cows and bulls were used for these bull festivals. First there is a bull run, intended to bring the animals to an open bullring with access to the sea. From here they are led by the participants towards the water.

After Bous a la Mar, the bulls are not killed, but brought back to the cattle farm. Here they wait to be used again for new bull festivals. These are bulls and cows that are rented out and, when they are no longer usable, they go to the slaughterhouse.

Toro Ensogado

Another gruesome bull festival we have documented is Toro Ensogado in Teruel. It is a street festival in which a rope is tied to the head of the bull. The idea is that the bull runs through the streets while the participants chase him, which is very stressful for the animal. Sometimes this takes up to 50 minutes per bull. In Teruel, a total of six bulls were used in Toro Ensogado this month.

CAS International and AnimaNaturalis are currently conducting the largest investigation ever into the abuses taking place in various bull festivals in Spain. Both organizations want to expose this animal suffering, not only in Spain but also abroad. The majority of Spaniards are against these kinds of events with bulls. Every year, about 18,000 bull festivals take place in Spain.

📹 A team of @AnimaNaturalis and CAS International documented the harassment of the bulls in the streets of Teruel (Spain) on the occasion of the patronal festivities.
Sign our petition: https://t.co/voiIkjgUFd https://t.co/UZt8RYZvRn

— CAS International (@CAS_Int) July 21, 2022

Subsidies

These kinds of bull festivals receive municipal, regional and national subsidies. The breeding of the bulls is partly financed by agricultural subsidies from the European Union. It is estimated that in Spain a total of 629 million euros of subsidy money ends up in bullfighting and festivals with bulls. 130 million comes from agricultural subsidies from the European Union.

Support our campaign and sign our petition so we can put an end to cruel bullfighting in Spain!

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