Just about all chickens raised for meat within the U.S. manufacturing facility farming machine are Cornish Pass birds. White Rock and Cornish chickens had been deliberately crossed to create a breed that grows unnaturally huge and speedy, maximizing the trade’s benefit. Because of their weight, some birds can not stand or stroll—and people who live on to succeed in “marketplace weight” are slaughtered at round 6-7 weeks of age. No longer simplest do they endure bodily on this machine, however those clever, socially advanced birds who’re acutely aware of their environments are denied the risk to have interaction of their maximum herbal behaviors, leading to mental struggling as smartly.
“Whilst the small pattern measurement calls for us to stay wary in our interpretations, those effects counsel that to enjoy certain welfare, chickens would possibly wish to be given the power to be told and to keep watch over sides in their atmosphere—on this case, get admission to to rewards,” wrote Sasha Prasad-Shreckengast, lead writer of the find out about and Farm Sanctuary’s Senior Supervisor of Analysis & Sanctuary Animal Welfare.