[bap]

My father owned a rural feed store until I was 6 or 7 years old (the early 80's.)

Other than incubators full of chicks and ducklings, and bottle feeding young livestock fresh from auction - swiping cow magnets off the shelf to play with was a favorite pass-time. :)

In those days I can't imagine anyone really cared what happened to the magnets after they went into the cow.

Perhaps something happens in the slaughter house to clear out whatever has gotten into the gut and stomachs - for the sake of meat grinding machinery?

[HeyLaughingBoy]

I think tripe is the only use an industrial abattoir would have for the stomach and that's likely to be handled by a human. My guess is that they have a bucket or something that they put foreign material into.

Hmmm, but I wasn't thinking of pet food: that would probably be ground.

[pfdietz]

I mean, you don't want the magnets, or any nails or what not they've picked up, to go into any separated products. And separating them from the guts shouldn't be too hard -- they'd be attracted to metal, after all. The question would be how rapidly they degrade.