Battery Hens Campaign: Background Information

The Life of Battery Hens

This situation has been brought about through specialisation of the poultry industry and genetic selection for egg laying properties (laying hens) as against meat production (for broilers). About half of all laying-type chicks are destroyed at one day of age simply because they have been born male. They are most commonly gassed, using carbon dioxide, or 'macerated'. A macerator chops the chicks up into small pieces, at high speed - rather like a food processor, but although this sounds horrific (and is not pleasant to imagine or watch), it is generally considered more humane than gassing. In some countries the male chicks are killed by even more inhumane methods, such as drowning.

Battery hens are artificially incubated, and the parent hens do not see their young. The 'broodiness' for which hens have traditionally been famed has actually been bred out through selection for egg production.

Many battery hens will be de-beaked at the hatchery. There has been a marked increase in the number of de-beaked hens in battery cages, probably due to an increase in routine de-beaking at hatcheries. De beaking is routinely carried out to reduce feather-pecking and cannibalism. Up to one third of the hen's beak is amputated using a red hot blade (or sometimes even more, when the operation goes wrong or is carried out quickly or inexpertly). This operation is painful, and the hens may suffer permanent pain (similar to that experienced by amputees) due to the presence of neuromas.

Hens are taken into the empty battery houses shortly before they start to lay - at about 18 weeks of age. Before they arrive, the house is cleaned thoroughly (to avoid infection/contamination from previous hens). The cages are as described above, cramped, barren and devoid of bedding or anything else of comfort or stimulation. There is no space to stretch or flap their wings, no substrate for dust bathing or food foraging and no straw for nest building. The wire mesh floors can lead to deformed and damaged feet.

Hens lay five or six times each week - today's hens can lay as many as 310 eggs a year. They can be stressed and aggressive pre-lay, because their natural instinct for privacy and nest-building behaviour has been thwarted. Also, there is a high incidence of malignant tumours of the oviduct in these high-producing laying hens.

The hens are fed automatically, and given water from drinkers. Prophylactic medicines are added routinely to their feed and drink. The lighting in the house is kept very low, in an attempt to reduce aggression, and 'day lengths' can be lengthened to extend laying periods.

Sometimes, the hens have to suffer 'forced moulting' periods, when the hours of daylight and quantity/quality of feed are reduced. This used to be done to take the hens rapidly into a second season of lay, but is less common now as hens are less likely to be kept for more than one laying year. Now it is mostly used to adjust egg supply, or to improve egg shell quality.

Battery hens are usually removed for slaughter as 'spent hens' at around 72 to 76 weeks of age. Kept in natural conditions, healthy hens can live for six years - and some live as long as ten years.

Battery hens can suffer during removal from their cages, handling, transport and slaughter. This suffering can be physical as well as psychological (stress and fear). It is a sad fact that the way production animals are treated often reflects their value to the producer, and 'spent hens' at the end of their productive lives have an extremely low value. They are frequently handled roughly, pulled from their cages and bundled into travelling crates, with legs and wings protruding (and sometimes trapped, bent and damaged as a consequence). As many as 30% suffer brittle or broken bones due to inactivity. It is common for battery hens to travel long distances to slaughter, and on the journey they can be subjected to freezing temperatures or hot weather (they are susceptible to heat stress, and can suffocate).

The 'spent hens' are usually slaughtered using electrical stunning followed by neck cutting, after which they enter a scalding tank. First they are hung ('shackled') upside down on moving conveyor belts, putting considerable pressure on their weak (and sometimes damaged/broken) legs, as well as causing stress. They can receive electric shocks from water splashing up from the stun tank before they are fully immersed, causing pain and distress. Also, some birds can be seen to flap their wings and rise above the stun bath, meaning that they have their necks cut unstunned. Some have been seen to avoid both electrical stunning and neck cutting, entering the scalding tank fully conscious.

Hens killed by Jewish and Muslim slaughter methods are not stunned before neck cutting.

Spent battery hens are used for pet foods, baby foods, convenience foods, soups and stocks. Dead hens sometimes contain unlaid eggs, which can be extracted and used in manufactured foods such as biscuits, pasta etc.

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