My uncle was a hard scrabble farmer. Tough old cuss, practical and old school. If an animal was failing or seriously injured, or impaired, he would take care of it by putting it down. “Why?” I asked one hot and hard day of indentured servitude (I actually enjoyed many days of hard labor under his expert instruction). And he told me this... “because they are in pain and they don’t understand.” Right or wrong it is what you did back in the days of hard scrabble farming.