"It's just like a bereavement," said Mr John Elmore, reflecting on the foot-and-mouth outbreak in Louth. He farms in Omeath, at the northern end of the Cooley Peninsula.
"Nobody is going about their daily work. People are just staring out the window, waiting to hear the latest report. It's total despair." He said farmers had grown more hopeful with every week that passed since the Meigh outbreak, but it was all for nothing. "It's total devastation, heartbreak," he said.
Mr Terry Treanor left work for home when news of the outbreak emerged. His father and brother run the family farm in Jenkinstown, just 200 yards from the outbreak. When he talked to The Irish Times, the family were waiting to hear about slaughtering.
The Treanors hold land away from their farm, but this is also close to one of the holdings used by the Rice farm.
Mr Treanor's father and brother were told to expect slaughtering to start at 3 p.m. yesterday. That time had come and gone, and nothing had happened. "Everyone is devastated," he said. "It hasn't really sunk in. You don't know what to do." He had just fed the cattle in the yard. "Maybe it was their last supper, but what can you do?"
Despite the possibility that stock would be destroyed, Mr Elmore said farmers would still use good husbandry. "They're still your sheep, they still need feeding. They're part of the family. When you go down to feed them you talk to them and they lick your hands and face. The whole thing is heart-breaking."
"People are completely beside themselves with grief," said Mr Johnny Butterly from Togher. He was one of the IFA representatives who rang farmers within the exclusion zone to break the news. "Some knew already but it wasn't easy. Families are sitting down to their tea this evening with animals dead outside, or knowing that they will be killed. It's alarming."
The IFA was organising counselling for the families to help them cope. "It will impinge on the area for a long time."
Seeing healthy animals being destroyed went against the grain, according to Mr Alan Boswell, who farms in the peninsula. "You are looking at day-old lambs and you struggled to keep them alive and they are going to be slaughtered. It's hard to put words on it. "You look at the bigger picture but you can't help looking at the local situation, neighbours and friends who will have stock and herds slaughtered."
"We have to deal with our grief now," said Mr Elmore, "but at some stage we have to ask who was responsible for this."
