Museum defends use of stuffed mules 19 (UPI) -- A Texas agricultural museum says the two mules it had killed and stuffed for an exhibit were destined for the slaughterhouse. The decision by the new American Museum of Agriculture in Lubbock has angered animal rights activists, WFAA-TV, Dallas, reports. Bob Williams of Ranch Hand Rescue in Williams, Texas, has offered to bury the carcasses on his farm. Phil Paramore of Museum Arts, which designed the exhibit showing a McCormick reaper, the first piece of agricultural machinery, said in a release the mules would have been shipped to Mexico for slaughter and used for pet food, the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal reported. He said he thinks using real animals adds a lot to the exhibit. "The reason that you use a real animal is to most accurately show the way the activity was done at this time," said Phil Paramore of Museum Arts in the release. A fiberglass replica just doesn't convey the same message. When we can find animals that were scheduled to be destroyed anyways and then immortalize them in an exhibit, we can really show their importance in the development of agriculture.