The SPCA ‘worked me over pretty good’
So says an 87-year-old Grey County farmer, who feels he was coerced into surrendering his sheep. But the SPCA argues no coercion was involved

by DON STONEMAN

Eighty-seven-year-old Mel Musson says he was ready to retire from farming this spring, when he would be able to shear and tag his 50-odd ewes and yearlings and sell the new crop of lambs. Bruce-Grey SPCA inspectors say they found sheep in peril and invited him to surrender them.

Musson says he felt coerced to surrender the sheep.

“I would not accept a coercion,” says Jennifer Bluhm, inspector for the Bruce-Grey SPCA and supervisor of the agent who investigated a complaint about Musson’s farm.

Musson has farmed in Grey County since he retired from the aerospace industry in 1986.
The World War Two veteran admits that prostate cancer and treatments are slowing him down. He has a big dog, reads voraciously and drives to Owen Sound for groceries regularly.

Twenty years ago, the former electrical engineer left the Hydro grid. He installed solar panels on the house and a diesel generator runs the barn lights.

Musson relates that, upon returning from shopping on Jan. 20, he found notices “plastered everywhere” that he should contact the area SPCA office immediately. The next day, Musson says, SPCA officials “worked me over pretty good” for about 90 minutes to convince him to sign a form to surrender the animals, and demanded that he immediately furnish names of people who would help him care for livestock if he was sick.

Musson says he didn’t get a chance to ask his neighbour Tom Gray for help. Gray says he left his name with an Ontario Provincial Police officer at the end of the lane to pass on to SPCA officers.

Musson says that, after he signed the surrender document, trucks and livestock trailers were there “in no time” and Gray believes the removal of livestock was premeditated and well-planned. Bluhm, however, says the duty notes of the agent who obtained the surrender show the trucks arrived two hours later.

Musson feels he was coerced. “They said the sheep were in terrible condition. They said there was no water in the barn.” Musson says sheep drink from a stream that has been diverted into the barn yard.

“I was threatened with a $5,000 fine because there were three sheep in the barn yard that weren’t buried yet. My tractor had broken down.”

The sheep were “very thin,” Bluhm says, and if they had not been surrendered they would likely have been seized.

Grey County Cattlemen’s Association president Ross Laycock, another neighbour, says there are many ambiguities associated with the case. No farm organization is going to defend anyone that isn’t going to keep livestock up to the current standard, Laycock says. There is a local movement to get the sheep back for the elderly farmer, which Laycock says is impractical. He calls the activists “do-gooders.” BF