Thousands of chicks shipped to farmers in Maine were dead on arrival after being sent through the U.S. Postal Service.
Some are citing the recent debate over the USPS realignment as the cause, The Associated Press reported.
The USPS is the only service that can ship live chicks and small animals. It has been doing it since 1918. The regulations read:
The following live, day–old animals are acceptable for mailing when properly packaged: chickens, ducks, emus, geese, guinea birds, partridges, pheasants (only during April through August), quail, and turkeys. All other types of live, day–old poultry are nonmailable. Day–old poultry vaccinated with Newcastle disease (live virus) also is nonmailable.
— Usps.com
Over the past few weeks at least 4,800 chicks that had been shipped alive arrived at their destinations dead.
One poultry business owner told The Portland Press Herald that all 800 chicks sent in one shipment had arrived dead.
Normally, Pauline Henderson said when she orders 100 chicks, two may die in a shipment.
Many of the birds that died went through a processing center in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts.
Rep Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) attributed the birds’ deaths to the issues that have been swirling through the USPS due to a reorganization process which was put on hold this week.
“It’s one more of the consequences of this disorganization, this sort of chaos they’ve created at the post office and nobody thought through when they were thinking of slowing down the mail,” Pingtree told the Press Herald. She said she’s received complaints from constituents who are getting dead animals instead of the live ones they’ve ordered.
Pingtree said the system worked before recent changes were rolled out.
She sent a letter to Postmaster General Louis DeJoy and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Commissioner Sonny Perdue, the Press Herald reported.
On Tuesday DeJoy put some of the changes to realign the postal service on hold until after the election. He is expected to testify before the Senate on Friday, the AP reported.
Some believe DeJoy had put the realignment plan in play before the election. The former businessman was a donor to President Donald Trump’s campaign and was appointed to the position in June.
Trump said last week that he wanted to slow election mail operations and was blocking $25 billion in emergency aid earmarked for the Postal Service He was also blocking a Democratic proposal for billions of election money to be sent to states for the processing of mail-in ballots, the AP reported.