This morning images surfaced showing the carcasses of over two hundred heads of chickens along the highway in the Spanish Lookout Community. News Five has since learnt that the chickens died as a result of heat strokes, caused by the over one hundred degree weekend temperatures. According to Henry Wiebe, a member of the Health Board in Spanish Lookout, chickens do sometimes die this way, but the farmer who did not dispose of them properly is being questioned and may be reprimanded.

Henry Weibe, Spanish Lookout Health Board

“The thing is that is a shame what happened there. It should have never happened. But sometimes people do things without thinking twice. That farmer there, his chickens had a heat stroke and so I guess he was down with his losses. He was trying to bring the chicken to the Spanish Lookout disposal area. But the gate was locked and so what he did was he just dumped them on the side of the road, which is unacceptable. I do not know what caused him to do that. I mean, I cannot justify what he did, and it is a shame and nevertheless it happened, but we cannot ignore that. But the concern I am seeing out there is if the chicken was sick or whatever. In a sense, when the chicken died, they were sick, they got a heat stroke, so that is a sick chicken. But it is not a disease that is going around, disease out here, that is not the case. These numbers are shocking for the Belizean people because they are not used these numbers. But in reality, it is sad for the farmers because he will not get any profit. His profit has died. So, he will be the one that will bear the cost.”

Paul Lopez

“So, you are saying it will not affect the availability of chicken?”

Henry Weibe

“Not that much because that is insignificant. For chicken Quality Poultry is producing, they slaughter about thirty thousand birds a day. So, this little drop of chicken is insignificant for them.”

Channel 5