Talk:Chick culling

AVMA
Please list what happens to these males after they are ground up, i.e. is it used for dog food,fertilizer, etc... How can the American Veterinary Medical Association be both opposed to and approve of this device at the same time?

Why the hell are people sick enough to use this!?!? Mitternacht90 21:37, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Ahh, the byproducts of modern society.Thursday Postal 23:12, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Images
Article needs photographs. Bastie 09:06, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Contesting Speedy Tag
This doesn't look like a speedyable article to me. The nominator objects to the naming, believing it to be a neologism, and while that's potentially grist for AFD, it's not a speedyable offense. This isn't a bad article; it's got verifiable content and citations, and at most should be re-named to something more topical, if such a name can be found. -Colin Kimbrell 16:51, 13 January 2006 (UTC)


 * I've moved the page anyway since baby is redundant. jimfbleak 16:53, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Needs a cleanup
This article seems a bit 'all over the place'. I am going to try to fix it up a bit.Darkcraft 11:40, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
 * I would like to add, I am not an expert on this subject, and I am pro-animal rights, so I may be slightly biased.Darkcraft 11:57, 4 September 2007 (UTC)
 * I like this section:


 * 1) Chicks which are not intended for rearing shall be killed as soon as possible and in any case before they are 72 hours old.
 * 2) Chicks should be killed by using a mechanically operated apparatus approved for this purpose in accordance with national legislation, designed and operated in such a way as to ensure that all chicks are killed immediately even if they are handled in large numbers.
 * 3) Gases or gas mixtures may only be used where the procedure is approved under national legislation. Measures shall be taken to ensure rapid death and to avoid suffocation under other birds by putting birds in a single layer and monitoring gas concentrations.
 * 4) To kill any living embryos instantaneously, all hatchery waste shall be treated without delay using the mechanical apparatus mentioned above or any living embryo must be killed without delay.


 * but without references to the official body that endorses those particular practices, I don't believe it can be included in the article. If someone could help me with finding a reference or something, I would appreciate it.Darkcraft 12:31, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

What the...?
Everything below 'see also' is not showing up for me in the main article, but is there on the 'edit' page. What is going on? Maybe my browser is just being silly. Oh well I was almost finished anyway, I will come back tomorrow and see if this problem has fixed itself.Darkcraft 12:50, 4 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Yeah I agree, but unfortunatly, the problem didn't fix itself. I will try to tell the people at the village pump what is going on with this "bug" and stuff. Best of luck! -- Pre ston  H  02:52, 6 September 2007 (UTC)


 * It's fixed! Pre  ston  H  03:30, 6 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks :D Darkcraft 13:14, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Broken Reference Link
The third References link, "http://www.upc-online.org/battery_hens/42203woodchipper.htm/" is malformed. With the trailing slash, the target page comes up blank. I am unable to edit the references (clicking "Edit" gives me a blank References section). Could someone with the ability to edit references please trim this trailing slash? Thank you :-) TTK 17:59, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Nice work spotting that. Even getting rid of the trailing slash for me didn't fix it though. Maybe the site is down or something. I found a similar link anyway, so I will replace it with that.Darkcraft 11:32, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
 * Oh, nevermind, someone has already fixed it and got that link working. Good work =D Darkcraft 11:33, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Non-Neutral Point of View
"Electrocution, a new method that has been touted as being cheap, reliable, and "humane" by its developers". The use of double-quotes around "humane" isn't providing a neutral point of view. It comes across as sarcasm or irony, neither of which belong on a wikipedia page. Newb of wiki (talk) 15:24, 14 June 2014 (UTC)
 * Agree. "Touted as" already indicates that those are the opinions of the developers.--Dodo bird (talk) 02:52, 19 June 2014 (UTC)

This article has general NPOV issues and has been tagged for POV check. The article's tone and references have a distinctly negative point of view. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ReasonedTraveler (talk • contribs) 02:32, 19 June 2014 (UTC)


 * You need to be more specific. Pretty much everything is presented in a straightforward, matter-of-fact way, except the single sentence in the controversy section, which is presented as the POV of Animal rights activists. It's difficult to see what exactly is not neutral about this article.--Dodo bird (talk) 02:52, 19 June 2014 (UTC)


 * The source for the suffocation method is several times removed. Putting chicks in plastic bags for suffocation *might* have been used in some 2nd/3rd world country but there are far more efficient methods. Maceration is so rapid (effectively instant) that the animal would feel no pain. There is a distinct "ICK" factor on this page and it should be revised! Smidoid (talk) 14:57, 12 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Please could you explain what you mean by "The source for the suffocation method is several times removed". DrChrissy (talk) 21:06, 12 April 2017 (UTC)


 * "Several times removed" means that the source quoted is quoting another source (which may not be reliable) and from what I recall applied to a 2nd/3rd world country. It's fair to say (for example) that people eat horse meat in parts of Europe for example - hence the ick factor. We don't do this in most of the West. Slaughter methods for chicks are a cause-celeb for some extreme vegans who want to make people feel bad so they are likely to grab onto these practises. The same sort of thing applies to removal of testes (caponizing) which is illegal in most of the west but still practised in Asia. I was recently told by a vegan that chickens are "forced" to lay eggs every day. This extreme views tend to percolate down to the average person and people don't understand farming. I appreciate that chickens are "forced" to lay longer than they would otherwise by artificial lighting, but this is rather different to the claims levelled at farmers etc. Smidoid (talk) 16:55, 15 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the reply. My understanding is that content can be added to articles if it is verifiable by an RS.  The suffocation method is certainly verifiable by the source given, so the question is whether it is an RS.  I have not seen "several times removed" used as an argument against a source before, however, I know of many sources, perhaps especially websites, which are clearly several times removed.
 * To my mind, the inclusion of mentioning the suffocation method, although a very distasteful and probably very cruel method, is done in a neutral way. If this practice occurs, and I have no reason to believe it does not, removing this would be censorship.
 * A little about myself to put this in context. In real life, I am a scientist working on animal welfare. Much of my career has been on the welfare of hens, and I totally understand that the average person understands little about farming practices.  By the way, rather than hens being "forced" to lay eggs by artificial lighting, take a look at forced molting.  DrChrissy (talk) 21:06, 15 April 2017 (UTC)


 * So you'll doubtless know the wonderful Mike Petrik (Mike the Chicken Vet) - as for suffocation, I wonder if we could put it more into a neutral context because right now it appears weighted with equal precedence as the other methods used widely in the industrial farming community. Like you, I've no doubt that it does occur, but nowhere near as widespread as the more human practise. I've had to do the C1 on a couple of sick (adult) birds and it's surprisingly difficult when done poorly. :( I've not seen forced moulting used here but we've banned it like caponizing - we use extended photoperiod with a sudden removal to force the moult. Still nowhere near as cruel as people are "told" Smidoid (talk) 21:51, 15 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Like you, I believe that suffocation by bag is not widespread, however, I have looked for sources which state this and I have not found any. So, I am not sure how we could weight it appropriately without it becoming OR - but happy to discuss.
 * Regarding the ban on forced moulting, where is "here" for you. If possible, please could you send me a reference so I can update the article. DrChrissy (talk) 22:33, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

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Chicken nuggets
Aren't these used to make chicken nuggets? Sardonic tradesman (talk) 17:23, 13 January 2017 (UTC)
 * If you mean "Are chicks used to make chicken nuggets?" the answer is "no". This article is about chicks of egg laying strains which only requires females to lay eggs. That is why the males are culled.  The meat-bird (broiler) industry grows both males and females and makes nuggets from birds at slaughter age (approx 5-6 weeks of age). DrChrissy (talk) 20:39, 13 January 2017 (UTC)


 * What is done with the meat?

Possible Commons copyright violations~
, can you tell me how all these pictures here can be your own work? ~ A discussion has been started here with commons admin board. The reason this is asked also on this talk page the editor has edited several files in the article. ~mitch~ (talk) 14:08, 19 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I have removed the files pending discussion on commons ~ ~mitch~ (talk) 19:09, 19 February 2020 (UTC)


 * I want to make it clear I am not opposed to photos depicting chick culling ~ But I do not believe that user Gaultier took those photos ~ therefore I am challenging the copyrighting license the editor used in commons ~ ~mitch~ (talk) 19:55, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

2020–21 French planned ban
Despite what several French and English-language media seem to be suggesting, there is no indication that French Agriculture Minister Didier Guillaume's repeatedly announced plans to 'ban chick culling by the end of 2021' includes a ban on gassing (asphyxiating, controlled atmosphere killing or whatever one might call it) chicks. All media sources only mention 'maceration', 'grinding' or 'broyage'. Unfortunately I wasn't able to find Guillaume's entire 28 January 2020 statement because all media quoted the same parts of it, namely « l’objectif, c’est de forcer les entreprises, la recherche, à faire cela fin 2021 (…) trouver la technique qui marche à grande échelle », otherwise I would have been able to check if he also mentioned gassing explicitly, or just 'maceration/broyage', or just a hypernym like 'culling', or perhaps misleadingly used the hypernyms and hyponyms as synonyms and thus theoretically leaving open the option of gassing remaining legal, just like in Switzerland. Le Monde came closest to pointing out this potential legal loophole, but did not say outright that Guillaume's plans excluded a ban on gassing: 'Parmi les voisins de la France, la Suisse a mis en place cette interdiction depuis le 1er janvier. Le mode d’abattage au moyen du CO2 y reste autorisé.' Note that 'cette interdiction' refers to the word 'broyés' in the previous sentence, strongly suggesting that only 'broyage' (=grinding, maceration) will be outlawed in France according to the Swiss example. I don't know if gassing is commonly practiced alongside grinding, but it could be that the gassing method spreads in France in the run-up to the announced [grinding] ban if hatcheries are unable or unwilling to adopt no-killing alternatives in the meantime as long as gassing is not explicitly included in the announced ban. Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 15:19, 21 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Apparently I'm not the only one seeing this potential loophole based on the fact that Guillaume didn't explicitly mention gassing. La Chaîne Info says: 'If the minister only mentioned grinding, asphyxiation with carbon dioxide must also be prohibited, his entourage told AFP.' I'll add that to the article. Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 15:28, 21 May 2020 (UTC)

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Escape Orbit POV pushing
Ok, Escape Orbit, please explain yourself. You're reverting everything I and other people have done on this page (which I think is "edit warring"), only backing it up with your personal opinion, and then you threaten to report me on my talk page. I understand that your opinion is that you don't think culling is a euphemism, but our opinions are supposed to be irrelevant. There are numerous sources showing people do think this (though you also removed those), so we should act accordingly. Trying to censor that sounds a lot like POV pushing (which is why I added the neutrality tag).

And not only are you reverting things that have to do with culling as a euphemism, but you're removing everything else I and Mitchellhobbs have done without any explanation. What's the deal here? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mariolovr (talk • contribs) 19:45, 13 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Hi. Please read this guideline here. If you are changing something, and it is reverted, it is your responsibility to "explain yourself" and obtain consensus for the change.  Repeatedly putting it back in is disruptive and edit warring.
 * The word culling is the article title and you don't get to censor it off the page. Wikipedia reflects reality, not what we want it to be.  Culling is a word used for the practice, and sourced as such.  It means "To select animals from a group and then kill them in order to reduce the numbers of the group in a controlled manner".  So clearly, there's more to it than just 'killing', and it is not just a euphemism.  And even if it was, it is again the sourced term used.
 * I'm sorry if I removed other content, but I am not going to spend my time picking through the article to repeatedly revert your change throughout it. Particularly when you are editing warring.  If you have a reliably sourced cite about people finding the term problematic then feel free to add.  Thanks. -- Escape Orbit  (Talk) 10:22, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
 * The word culling may be the title, but the more I look into this, the more I think it shouldn't be. Just because something was initially done the wrong way, that doesn't mean we should keep doing it like that. The French and Spanish articles are titled "Chick slaughter", and the Hebrew article is even title "Chick crushing". There are more articles on "chick killing" then there are on "chick culling", probably because journalists view it as more neutral and more easily understood by the layman. Yes, wikipedia "reflects reality", and the reality is that "chick killing" is used and there is an abundance of people who view the term "culling" as a euphemism and are against using it.   (Like I said, I had already included citations, but you removed them) Continuing to use it outside of stating the industry term is biased. It's just not wikipedia's place to side with the industry.
 * Also, can you please provide sources that there are even people who are against the neutral term "killing" or the more descriptive terms like "crushing", "grinding", etc. Everything I've found shows the opposite.
 * Even if "culling" is occasionally the source term (though it's more usually just described as killing), that doesn't mean it should be the wikipedia term, just like "collateral damage" may be the source term, but it's still unacceptable to use on wikipedia when it refers to civilian deaths.
 * Also, I may have taken your advice about cooperation seriously if you actually meant it, but you obviously don't even care what you revert, so how can I discuss it with you? It's funny. You've made more reverts than me, yet you accuse me of "edit warring" (such a silly and needlessly aggressive term)? Do you not see the hypocrisy? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mariolovr (talk • contribs)


 * If you think the article is at the wrong title, you can submit a WP:RM, but the terminology should remain consistent with the article title, whatever that is. - MrOllie (talk) 15:01, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Is that really a rule? Mariolovr (talk) 17:03, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Hi everyone, I recently did a large expansion of the article and I have used the terms 'culled' and 'killed' interchangeably as synonyms, just like the sources that I referenced do, too. I do not have a specific preference for either; I understand that some people consider them to each represent a point of view in favour or against the practice, but I don't, and as there is no generally accepted neutral term, I think it's best to leave the situation as I had left it, in which they are used interchangeably. When I did my improvements, this article just so happened to feature the title 'Chick culling', and the Commons category about it that I found just so happened to feature the title 'Unwanted chick killing', I think that balances things out. Nederlandse Leeuw (talk) 19:10, 14 September 2020 (UTC)

Removal of unsourced phrase from lede
I removed the following phrase (italics) from the lede because it makes no sense in this context:

As written, the use of the laser seems to be a gender test, not a killing method. Even so, it's not sourced, nor mentioned in the body of the article, so I'm wondering why it's even here.

Thoughts, anyone? &mdash; UncleBubba ( T @ C ) 17:02, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

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"Chick slaughtering" listed at Redirects for discussion
An editor has identified a potential problem with the redirect Chick slaughtering and has thus listed it for discussion. This discussion will occur at Redirects for discussion/Log/2022 April 29 until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Steel1943 (talk) 10:13, 29 April 2022 (UTC)

Map wrong - Country Austria
In the map, Austria is both listed as country where chick culling is banned (in the text below the image) but also as country where chick culling is legal (color red on the map). See here: https://i.imgur.com/k0m13Fo.png I'm no legal expert but according to https://www.tierschutz-austria.at/ende-der-eintagskueken-oder-doch-nicht/ it seems chick culling is still legal in most cases in austria. Petropawlowson (talk) 11:22, 25 January 2024 (UTC)


 * I thought it justified to delete the mention of austria from the list of countries that banned chick culling altogether. But I still wanted to leave the discussion open in case someone has more legal knowledge about it and can chime in. Petropawlowson (talk) 11:32, 25 January 2024 (UTC)
 * Very bizarre, I just found which claims that Austria has made the practice illegal. I updated the article accordingly. If there is no objection, I'll go ahead and ping the editor who made the map to see if they're available to have it updated. Otherwise, I might have a crack at it myself when there's time. spintheer (talk) 03:24, 7 July 2024 (UTC)
 * OK, I see that this account hasn't been active since January, so I'll go ahead and ping. If you have an objection please feel free to step in when you see this. spintheer (talk) 02:41, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

"Statistics" out of date
In the section Chick culling#Statistics, it lists statistics for France and Germany. But the article states these countries no longer cull male chicks. If this is really true, shouldn't the culling quantity (at least for male chickens) for France and Germany be shown as "zero", or simply removed from this section? Harris7 (talk) 13:45, 30 January 2024 (UTC)

The headline 7 billion chicks culled does not have a primary source
In the third sentnece, there is the oft cited figure of 7 billion chicks culled each year. The current citation is a secondary source, also claiming 7 billion chicks and pointing to a web page: https://web.archive.org/web/20160810232554/http://www.thepoultrysite.com/articles/3446/global-poultry-trends-2014-rapid-growth-in-asias-egg-output/

However, this webpage doesn't say anything about how many chicks are culled. What it does say is that the worldwide estimated number of egg laying chickens in 2013 is around 7 billion. It should be clear that these are not the same. At a basic level, since egg laying chickens are productive for 2-3 years, then if it's 50-50 male-female, then the number of culled males would be somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 of that figure. But then there are plenty of female chicks that get culled too, and it all gets complicated and without a primary source we can make up whatever number we like.

This figure of 7 billion seems have been around since 2015. But it doesn't make sense for the number of culled chicks to remain the same, while the number of egg-laying chickens is increasing.

More broadly, there don't seem to be any estimates of chick culling outside of Western countries, so we shouldn't even be making any positive statements of fact about global numbers. Instead, I propose using a verifiable fact with a specific time associated with it. E.g. "The US and Europe culled approximately Z chicks in 20XX", assuming anyone can find a primary source. If I have time, I'll keep looking for one. Multihuntr (talk) 19:38, 18 February 2024 (UTC)


 * It's a good point. Although we must be careful with basing ourselves in WP:PRIMARY sources, if the secondary source seems baseless, it's not very reliable either. Chick culling mentions several worldwide estimates, but it's often difficult to track down what these estimates are really based upon.
 * The Sydney Morning Herald states Of the estimated 6 billion male chicks killed each year around the world, about 12 million are gassed or shredded in Australia. No source or implication where they got that figure from.
 * The Guardian states An estimated 4-6 billion male chicks are slaughtered globally every year because they serve no economic purpose.
 * It links to a Wattagnet article, which says: Skilled workers in the egg industry are only able to identify the sex of the chick after it hatches, FFAR stated in a press release. For the 6 billion laying hens hatched each year worldwide, a similar number of male chicks are produced that never make it to market. So the number of male chicks culled every year is estimated based on the number of female laying hens which hatch every year. The problem is of course that there isn't such a 1:1 sex ratio in hatching chicks, and it completely omits the killing of male chicks in the meat poultry industry, where it is also mostly female chickens (meat hens) which are fattened and slaughtered for human consumption, while the cockerels are also culled as unwanted.
 * Wattagnet mostly verbatim quotes what the FFAR stated on their own website: Skilled workers in the egg industry are only able to identify the sex of the chick after it hatches. For the 6 billion laying hens hatched each year worldwide, a similar number of male chicks are produced that never make it to market.
 * It's still a mystery to me how The Guardian managed to turn "6 billion" into "An estimated 4-6 billion", as neither FFAR nor Wattagnet seems to indicate a reason to lower that 6 billion figure.
 * I suppose we shall have to turn to scholarly estimates in journals, as the newspapers don't seem to be able to get reliable fact-checkable figures. NLeeuw (talk) 21:33, 18 February 2024 (UTC)
 * PS: Not sure what FFAR means when they say "male chicks (...) that never make it to market". Nor do their sisters; the laying hens lay eggs, and those eggs make it to the market. Sure, laying hens at the end of their optimally productive life are usually slaughtered and sold for meat on the market as well, but that's not really the ethical concern here, is it? The concern is not whether the consumer ever gets to buy and eat every chicken that is ever born; the concern is that billions of chicks are born and immediately killed after hatching because humans have decided their lives would be useless if they can't lay eggs or be fattened up for meat. Moreover, some male chicks are kept because a limited number of roosters will still be necessary to procreate the next generation of chickens, and nobody will raise ethical concerns over whether those breeding roosters will "never get to the market". I may be pedantic, but because newspapers and websites don't get this correct, people make mistakes in estimates like this all the time, and that really adds up once you're talking about billions. NLeeuw (talk) 22:48, 18 February 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm afraid it has become a real citogenesis problem. The first 4 hits I'm getting on Google Scholar all refer to Krautwald-Junghanns 2018, which refers to the Poultry Site 2015, which never mentions anything about chick culling, only about numbers of laying hens hatching. (In some Dutch-language news sources I see a lot of "5 billion" claims, but no links or references to primary sources either).
 * One thing I can say is that, according to, 58,110,000,000 (58.1 billion) chickens (Hühner, chickens of either sex) were slaughtered in 2011. I'm not sure whether this is only meat hens, or also includes laying hens after they were discarded by egg farmers, or also unhealthy female chicks, but it should include all male chicks and grown roosters. In that sense, 4, 5, 6, or 7 billion unwanted male chicks culled every year do not seem at all impossible. If anything, I would estimate them even higher, given that meat poultry producers also prefer hens over roosters (which are more difficult to keep and fatten) and therefore also tend to cull most male chicks that have just hatched. And we are now in 2024, and the globally farmed poultry population has probably increased a lot since 2011 as well. NLeeuw (talk) 22:01, 18 February 2024 (UTC)
 * "Avian sex determination and sex diagnosis"" (2003). World's Poultry Science Journal, 59(01), 5–64. doi:10.1079/wps20030002 . By-products of commercial layers (and of layer parents) cannot be used for meat production, and ethical concerns centre around their disposal. Numbers involved at this level are approximately 40 million chicks in Germany, 400 million in Europe and 4 billion world-wide. It's an old 2003 estimate, but at least it's not dependent on the Poultry Site. If we were already at 4 billion in 2003, that number has probably increased with the growth of the poultry population worldwide.
 * eISBN: 978-90-8686-808-7. ISBN: 978-90-8686-260-3. https://doi.org/10.3920/978-90-8686-808-7. On a yearly basis around 4 billion of these ‘useless’ male chicks are produced (280 million in Europe, 230 million in the USA), which is a conservative estimation as there are 5.7 billion laying hens (...). This is all I could excerpt from Aerts & De Tavernier 2016 (the whole chapter is for sale for €38.15). Although this book has been published 13 years later, they also estimate 4 billion male chicks, but their Europe estimate is off by 120 million (30%). Also, they claim there are 5.7 billion laying hens, which is what the Poultry Site claimed there were in 2005 (5,690 million, to be more precise). So the figures of Aerts & De Tavernier 2016 seem outdated by at least 10 years, while the discrepancies within Europe are left unexplained. NLeeuw (talk) 22:35, 18 February 2024 (UTC)

Austria and Luxembourg
As shown here:, Austria and Luxembourg have both banned the systematic killing of male chicks. I've added a line about this in the article, but I thought that the map could also be updated to reflect that. Since they made the current map, I'm opening this thread to ping @Nederlandse Leeuw and see if they might be available to update it. spintheer (talk) 02:51, 8 July 2024 (UTC)


 * Thanks for calling this to my attention. I haven't checked for updates on the legal situation in a long time. Last time I updated the map was in 25 July 2021. The source you are citing dates from December 2022. I'll need to do a thorough reading of news coverage / literature to assess the current situation. NLeeuw (talk) 15:22, 8 July 2024 (UTC)
 * I added a source citing the Austrian Tierschutzgesetz amendments (2a and 2b) in effect since 1 January 2023. It seems that just like Switzerland, Austria has only forbidden shredding (maceration) of chicks, but not gassing (asphyxiation):
 * (2a) Das Schreddern von lebendigen Küken ist verboten. Ebenso ist das Töten lebensfähiger Küken verboten, sofern diese nicht der Futtergewinnung dienen. Dieser Verwendungszweck ist jederzeit auf Verlangen von der Brüterei der Bezirksverwaltungsbehörde nachzuweisen.
 * (2b) Im Falle einer Anwendung einer Methode zur Früherkennung des Geschlechts während der Brut und der Aussortierung von Küken im Embryonalstadium ist dies ab dem siebenten Bebrütungstag nur mit Betäubung erlaubt. Nach dem 14. Bebrütungstag ist die Aussortierung verboten.
 * The second sentence of 2a seems to implicitly legalise asphyxiation of chicks, as long as it "serves fodder (feed) production". That means I'll have to colour Austria purple, just like Switzerland.
 * For Luxembourg I haven't yet found the official legal provisions. Lots of news outlets say Luxembourg "banned" it, but what exactly, and when? If it has been enacted, we should be able to cite it. As Luxembourgish law is all in French, it might take some time to find out what they're talking about in French legalese. Something with "abattage des poussins", or "broyage" if it's only maceration (shredding). NLeeuw (talk) 09:12, 10 July 2024 (UTC)
 * All I can find so far is the Loi sur la protection des animaux (Deiereschutzgesetz) of 2018. It does include a provision that might be interpreted as such:
 * Article 12 : Pratiques interdites (Article 12: Prohibited practices):
 * Il est interdit: (It is prohibited:) ... 12. d’éliminer des animaux pour des raisons exclusivement économiques; (12. to eliminate animals for exclusively economic reasons;).
 * Some literature suggests this stipulation was made purposely vague in order to not explicitly ban all chick killing.
 * Dossier consolidé Projet de loi 6994 Projet de loi sur la protection des animaux (6 December 2023) makes clear that in the original bill, Article 12 stipulation 13 was just 13. d’éliminer des poussins pour des raisons économiques; (13. to eliminate chicks for economic reasons;). But "chicks" was made "animals", and the word "exclusively" was added, thus creating a potential loophole.
 * But that act was already on the books in 2018. So what changed in Luxembourg late 2022? I have yet to find it... NLeeuw (talk) 09:53, 10 July 2024 (UTC)
 * I think nothing changed in Luxembourgish law in 2022. The claim that it has banned all chick killing appears to be based solely on interpretations of the 2018 Animal Protection Act article 12 stipulation 12 above. Luxembourg was just one of several countries in 2022 supporting an EU-wide ban, and there was a meeting of EU member state ministers of Agriculture in Luxembourg in October 2022 on the subject, but Luxembourgish law itself didn't change in that year.
 * So we would have to interpret the 2018 Act as banning chick culling some way, despite not explicitly saying so. We've got no choice.
 * David Hiez. Une nouvelle loi de protection des animaux au Luxembourg : pragmatisme ou inventivité vague ?. Revue semestrielle de droit animalier, 2019, nº 1-2. ffhal-04553835f (Submitted on 1 May 2024). seems the most useful source for interpretation.
 * «...La quatrième rubrique concerne le domaine économique: le fait d’éliminer des animaux pour des raisons exclusivement économiques » (ibid., (13)). Le projet de loi portait sur l’écrasement des poussins, mais la disposition a été utilement généralisée. A suivre les commissions agricoles qui se sont exprimées, cette disposition était facile à adopter dans la mesure où ces pratiques n’ont pas cours au Grand-Duché. Le choix du terme « éliminer » a été discuté, puisqu’il est plus souvent parlé de mise à mort; le choix a toutefois été maintenu, afin de couvrir les situations dans lesquelles une personne cesserait d’alimenter un animal économiquement inutile en le laissant mourir.
 * "...The fourth stipulation concerns the economic sphere: the elimination of animals for exclusively economic reasons" (ibid., (13)). The bill concerned the crushing of chicks, but the provision was usefully generalised. According to the agricultural committees that expressed themselves, this provision was easy to adopt insofar as these practices do not exist in the Grand Duchy. The choice of the term "to eliminate" was discussed, since it is more often referred to as putting to death (mise à mort); however, the choice was retained, in order to cover situations in which a person would stop feeding an economically useless animal by letting it die.
 * If these practices did not exist in Luxembourg at the time (and still do not), then perhaps there was no reason to create a loophole for the domestic industry. On second reading, the other reason for changing "chicks" to "animals" in general was to include et des veaux ("and calves"), and later any other animal species that the legislator might have forgotten, as well as the broader term "to eliminate", in order to prevent loopholes rather than creating them. (For good reason; e.g. I've read reports that in certain parts of India, cattle cannot be legally slaughtered, but companies just starve and exhaust them until they die in order to process and sell the meat anyway, thus skirting regulations. Such attempts to circumvent animal welfare legislation are known around the world, so the Luxembourgish legislators were quite cautious in their phrasing). Given that a lot of news around the 2018 Act was celebratory that Luxembourg was the first country in the world to ban chick and calf killing for exclusively economic reasons, the interpretation appears justified.
 * I guess I just missed it all, and thought that France and Germany were the first to do so in 2020 per 2022. The big countries stealing away tiny Luxembourg's pride (of banning something that wasn't done within its borders, but it did set a legal precedent). Alright, I'll update the article and map. NLeeuw (talk) 10:40, 10 July 2024 (UTC)
 * ✅. NLeeuw (talk) 11:53, 10 July 2024 (UTC)
 * Woah, brilliant. It was difficult finding these sources in English (the only language I'm good for here), so this is great. Down the line, perhaps there'll be proper secondary sources summarizing and interpreting these laws and we'll be able to cite those directly. spintheer (talk) 14:20, 10 July 2024 (UTC)
 * @Spintheer You're welcome. Polyglot historian + DeepL Translate at your service! NLeeuw (talk) 18:03, 10 July 2024 (UTC)

Belgium and the Netherlands
I've got some updates for the rest of the Benelux countries: the Netherlands and Belgium, more specifically the Flemish, Walloon and Brussels regions of Belgium.
 * Wallonia, which first introduced a Walloon Animal Welfare Code in 2019 (1 year after neighbouring Luxembourg updated its Animal Protection Act in 2018), appears to have prohibited the broyage (maceration, crushing, shredding) of male chicks in 2021, but not the gazage (gassing, asphyxiation). This December 2022 question of Jean-Luc de Crucke (former Walloon Minister of Finance, then Walloon MP of the opposition) to the Walloon Animal Welfare Minister shows this: Wallonia has banned the crushing of male chicks in 2021. However, gassing is still permitted! (...) The Minister undertook to assess the situation once she had received the "Live or Die" study. Having been in possession of this document for several months, can she now take a position and indicate when the issue will be referred to the Government? Animal Welfare Minister Céline Tellier responded: Indeed, the killing of day-old chicks raises a real ethical question, and I fully agree with the honourable member. The ban on the grinding of chicks, as well as the carrying out of a study on alternatives to this practice, constitute initial progress in Wallonia on this important subject. (...) In Wallonia, there is only one hatchery, and it keeps all the chicks it hatches, because these are breeds raised for meat. I am very pleased that we have been able to ban the grinding of chicks, with a view to anticipating possible future practices. (...) She stopped short of confirming that gassing chicks happens in (relation to) that hatchery, but argued that it is justified (at least for now) as it produces "meat". Now I'm not sure whether that meat is used for fodder (feed) for other animals, as in the Austrian case, but that seems likely. Actually "raising" male chicks to roosters for meat is very rarely practiced, as it is usually not economically viable. If that one hatchery in Wallonia did not use gassing as a killing method, there wouldn't be a reason not to ban it altogether, just like in neighbouring Luxembourg. At any rate, I'll need to find a better third-party source that describes the situation properly.
 * 8 juillet 2021 - Arrêté du Gouvernement wallon relatif à la protection des animaux au moment de leur mise à mort (M.B. 27.07.2021) (8 July 2021 - Order of the Walloon Government relating to the protection of animals at the time of their killing (MB 27.07.2021)). This appears to be the 2021 amendment which prohibited the broyage of chicks in Wallonia. Chapter 9 is fully dedicated to it:
 * CHAPITRE IX. - Mise à mort des poussins.
 * Art. 14. Il est interdit de mettre à mort les poussins de volailles domestiques de l'espèce Gallus gallus par méthode de broyage, telle que visée à l'annexe I du règlement n° 1099/2009.


 * CHAPTER IX. - Killing of chicks.
 * Art. 14. It is prohibited to kill chicks of domestic poultry of the species Gallus gallus by method of broyage (grinding, maceration, crushing, shredding), as referred to in Annex I to Regulation No 1099/2009.
 * The fact that they specify which killing method is not allowed anymore implies all others are still permitted. The Animal Welfare Minister euphemistically implicitly said as much. So Wallonia is following the Swiss model, also adopted by Austria. Interestingly, in neither Flanders nor Wallonia, any mention is made to "(exclusively) economic reasons". Wallonia just bans a specific killing method, Flanders just bans killing altogether (at some point in the future), full stop. No reason necessary. NLeeuw (talk) 16:26, 11 July 2024 (UTC)
 * RTBf news item March 2021
 * In addition to ensuring consistency with two neighbouring countries to prevent these practices from spreading to Wallonia, the Region wants to ensure compliance with its Animal Welfare Code, which prohibits the unnecessary killing of animals. That sounds very noble, but without a ban on gassing, Wallonia did not prevent the broader phenomenon of chick culling from spreading to it. Unlike Luxembourg, it seems to have deliberately chosen to create a loophole for gassing in that one hatchery. If "the unnecessary killing of animals" is really what concerns you, then you do not ban just 1 method of killing – that isn't practiced inside your jurisdiction anyway, but you ban the very act of killing (or "elimination", including deliberate starvation, as Luxembourgish lawmakers keenly discerned). The Austrians at least had a good reason for permitting asphyxiation for feed production. NLeeuw (talk) 20:08, 11 July 2024 (UTC)
 * The GAIA report on Minister Tellier p 5 Dutch version (French version) states: Ban on chick crushing: This preventive measure designed to protect the animals at the time of killing is to be welcomed. This measure may be positive, but remains incomplete. Indeed, gassing of day-old chicks is still possible, even though there are no businesses in Wallonia where this is practiced. (En effet, le gazage des poussins d'un jour demeure toujours possible, alors qu'aucun exploitation n'est concernée en Wallonie.) Well, this is news. I appear to have been mistaken that this one hatchery in Wallonia did employ gassing, but even the country's main welfarist organisation denies it. Even stranger, then, is why the regional Walloon government decided not to ban killing day-old chicks altogether, if neither grinding nor gassing was practiced in Wallonia at all. Why would the Minister get so defensive and evasive about it, seeking to shelter even that one hatchery from criticism that did not even apply to it? Odd. I'm starting to wonder how many businesses in Flanders and the Netherlands even practice grinding and gassing; one might wonder what all the fuss is about in opposing a ban on a practice that nobody appears to engage in... we'll see. NLeeuw (talk) 21:03, 11 July 2024 (UTC)


 * For the Netherlands, I've just updated the situation. In short: no ban yet, because the issue is complex, but the Agriculture Ministry concluded agreements with the poultry industry on structurally reducing chick killing already, in anticipation of a more definitive solution.
 * For Flanders, I've also just updated the situation. In short: a formal ban has been adopted, but not yet taken effect. The Flemish Government has been granted the authority to set the date of implementation at a later time. (Predictably, this move was welcomed by the poultry industry to give it more time to prepare for the eventual ban, but criticised by welfare organisations who found an indefinite delay to its implementation difficult to justify in the face of animal suffering).
 * For the Brussels Capital Region, a decision seems yet far away. In April 2024, it commenced talks on a Brussels Animal Welfare Code (after Wallonia and Flanders had already done so), but it is not in any hurry to vote on anything. The main controversy there is whether or not to enact a ban on unstunned ritual slaughter (as Flanders did some years ago); whether there are also talks to ban chick killing is yet unclear, and does not appear to be a priority. (If there are no hatcheries within its borders anyway, like in Luxembourg, it should be an easy decision). NLeeuw (talk) 16:24, 11 July 2024 (UTC)
 * "In the Brussels-Capital region, according to 2010 statistics data, there were 21 farms, whose 7 breeding farms, generally dairy and poultry farms, on a total of 268 ha of workable agricultural land." That suggests there was at least 1 chicken hatchery in the Brussels Capital region 14 years ago. Recent statistics are hard to come by. It is a highly urbanised region with little room for agriculture. It seems that there are lots of small-scale, non-industrial poultry farm estalishments in the region of Brussels, but little to no industrial poultry farming. But I can't say anything for certain about that. NLeeuw (talk) 17:00, 11 July 2024 (UTC)
 * https://statbel.fgov.be/nl/themas/landbouw-visserij/land-en-tuinbouwbedrijven#figures Alright, I checked out these annual statistics on farming in Belgium. It appears that there was only 1 meat poultry farm in Brussels with 20,000 chickens until 2019. It disappears from the records in 2020, where there is an odd statistic saying there are '2' laying hen chickens for consumption eggs in all of Brussels, which disappear again in 2021. In the last 4 years, there are 0 poultry companies in the Brussels Region according to these official statistics. Technically, chicks could still be imported from elsewhere to be killed in the city, but I doubt it. I'll check one more animal welfare report on Brussels. NLeeuw (talk) 17:26, 11 July 2024 (UTC)
 * The 2024 GAIA report on the record of Brussels Minister for Animal Welfare Bernard Clerfayt criticises him on p. 4 for not having introduced a "ban on chick killing by grinding or gassing", but it doesn't explain its importance. The focus is on other issues such as unstunned ritual slaughter, pets, animal testing, stray animals etc. It confirms there is currently no ban on chick killing in Brussels Capital Region, but also that it's not that high on the agenda of even welfarists. If it does happen, it's not on a large scale. NLeeuw (talk) 17:36, 11 July 2024 (UTC)

Ireland, Portugal and Spain
Given that Ireland, Spain, Luxembourg, Austria and Portugal supported Germany and France's call in July 2021 for an EU-wide ban, and we know the situation in Lux, Aus, Ger and France by now, how are things inside Ireland, Portugal and Spain?
 * Ireland: Irish welfarists from Ethical Farming Ireland claimed in April 2023: In Ireland culling does not happen because all chicks in the commercial egg sector are imported at one day old from the UK, which is worse because the chicks also have the stress of long distance transport. That includes organic and free range farms. However there is some limited killing of male chicks in other sectors, for example in the broiler and duck industries. So Ireland would not be gravely affected directly by an EU-wide ban, as long as it can keep importing from the UK, although we can assume the Irish counted on a continental shift in the egg industry to enable getting those laying hens through some other means, probably by in-ovo sexing. Nevertheless, it hasn't actually banned chick killing on the territory of the Republic yet.
 * Spain: All I know is that the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture sought to phase out and ban chick culling by the end of 2021, which evidently did not happen. It was quite difficult to find any sources on Spain at all at the time, so I'll have to try again and see what else I can find 3 years on.
 * Portugal: Euroweeklynews 9 Sep 2023 has some bits and pieces, but not much. It is essentially an English translation of SicNoticias. Here is a link to the Bill submitted by Inês Sousa Real (People Animals Nature party) to the Portuguese Parliament on 25 July 2023, proposing to ban chick culling in Portugal, não tendo ainda sido aprovado ou chumbado "but has not yet been approved or rejected." This is basically what all news sources repeat in Portuguese. One year on, it seems Portugal hasn't moved any closer to a ban, despite supporting an EU-wide ban. NLeeuw (talk) 21:56, 11 July 2024 (UTC)