What was going to be a normal, sunny and hot Wednesday of July turned out to be a very important day for many of us who believe in animal protection and take a steady position against vivisection.
That morning the Italian police went to Green Hill — the infamous beagle farm in Montichiari, near Brescia — to carry out its closure, as stated by the Public Prosecutor's Office. Green Hill, which bred thousands of beagles to be sold to laboratories, was shut down on the strength of several alleged crimes, among them animal abuse.
Today in Italy, ethics wins against economic interests.
— Mario Alfiero, “Green Wave”, and the Elitism staff
What happened next
The closure was not a temporary gesture. The roughly 2,500 beagles still inside were seized and, over the following months, rehomed across Italy — one of the largest animal-adoption efforts the country had seen. The case became a turning point: in 2013 Italy passed legislation sharply restricting the breeding of dogs, cats and primates for experimentation on its soil. Green Hill never reopened.
Reading it again in 2026
More than a decade later, the Green Hill morning still reads as proof of a simple, stubborn idea: that sustained public pressure can overturn an entrenched commercial interest. The campaign was loud, long and often dismissed as naive — and then, on an ordinary hot Wednesday, it won. The beagles became a symbol precisely because the outcome was so rare. People had the power. For once, they used it, and it held.