A Galway farmer is “looking down the barrel” of a lengthy prison sentence, a district court judge has said after a guilty plea was lodged by the farmer and the judge heard evidence in relation to the discovery of over 200 dead calves on a Co Galway farm in April 2021.

Ballinasloe District Court heard on Thursday that Department of Agriculture inspectors found over 200 dead calves on the farm of Enda Mulleady near Ballygar, Co Galway, in April 2021.

Mulleady is facing a number of charges relating to alleged breaches of animal health law.

Counsel for the Department of Agriculture told the court that “calves were lying listless” on the farm and that some were lying “in cold water in sheds”.

The Department is seeking an order from the court for the farmer to be banned for keeping animals under 12 weeks of age.

Witness for the Department, veterinary inspector with the Department of Agriculture Eamonn Clarke, told the court that Mulleady first came to the Department’s attention in April 2020 and he was advised to get a Teagasc plan on “how to rear calves properly” and to limit numbers in the coming year.

“For the rest of the summer, there were no welfare issues on the farm,” he said.

Dairy bull calves

He said in 2021, Mulleady had “moved in up to 300 calves, dairy bull calves” and that the calves “were fairly worthless really".

He also said that because of the way the calves were reared, they could have been be immunocompromised before Mulleady received them.

Clarke said that he received information that around 100 calves were dead on the farm and that he and another inspector went out to the farm on 13 March 2021 and found the “dead animals out the back and a few in the shed”.

Clarke added that the calf carcases were between two and six to seven weeks of age.

The judge was also presented with photos of calves which were alive and walking around the dead calves.

After the inspectors visited, Mulleady was given seven days to remove the dead animals and told not to buy more calves.

The court heard that money was owed to the knackery and therefore it wasn’t willing to remove the animals until the money was paid. An agreement was reached and the stock was removed.

Reckless

Counsel for the Department said the incident was a “gross failure” and “reckless”. The court heard from Mulleady’s defence counsel that he had spent over €1,500 to try to treat the calves.

Counsel for Mulleady said that the issue came about because his client had purchased immunocompromised calves, that the calves had developed pneumonia and that he couldn’t deal with it “once it got in the herd” and that he hasn’t come to the Department’s attention since.

Lengthy sentence

Judge Faughnan said he needed to know how and why the incident happened.

“He is looking down the barrel of a lengthy sentence. Anyone who would allow this to happen…there’s something missing. I can’t decide this today. He will be going to prison for as long as I can send him.

“I want a detailed medical report, a psychological report and bovine reports. These pictures are as bad as I have ever seen. I come from a farm, I know what I’m talking about. I want expert views [on this]. It’s beyond belief,” he said.

Judge Faughnan said that to measure an appropriate sentence he needed more information.

If convicted, Mulleady faces a class A fine of up to €5,000 or six months in prison. The case will be heard again in January.