Transporting to Processing and Getting Ready for the Next Flock

The chickens have almost reached market weight by six weeks and are generally a week away from transport. The barn is dimly lit at this point – and that’s exactly how they like it (it helps to keep them calm, cool and from hurting each other). Soon, it will be time for the chickens to be picked up and transported to the processing plant.

When the time comes for chickens to be transported to the processing plant, trained workers arrive to catch – by hand – all 25,000 chickens, where they’ll then head off to be processed. Not only are the workers who round up the chickens trained in animal welfare techniques, they are financially penalized for any chickens who arrive at the plant with injuries. Chickens are caught and placed in cages for their safety during the short drive (generally less than 45 minutes) to the processing plant, and this is the only time in a broiler chicken’s life that it spends in a cage.