William Warner of Thedford has won his appeal against a $13,000 fine involving trucking 270 relatively heavy market hogs to market on Jan. 28.
Warner testified he has 30 years experience trucking hogs and had used the Berdex trailer to haul about 250 loads before that day.
It had 30 hogs each in eight compartments and 15 each in another two compartments.
Seven were dead and three unable to walk when they arrived at the packing plant where a Canadian Food Inspection Agency official laid charges for over-crowding resulting in a fine of $13,000.
In her decision, Marthanne Robson of the Canada Agriculture Review Tribunal, wrote “I find that the applicant (Warner) took into account the risk factors that could reasonably be viewed as having an impact on the animals’ capacity to withstand loading, confining, transporting and unloading.
“The applicant relied on their experience using the Berdex
trailer as well as the experience of the driver.
“The applicant relied on visual inspection not a weight and space density calculation.”
She further wrote that “the hogs did not exhibit any physical signs of overcrowding other than the common stress of transportation.”
