End-of-lay hens face welfare challenges during their final weeks on farm and during depopulation, an area that receives less attention than production-phase welfare.
The end-of-lay period is a welfare blind spot: regulatory attention focuses on production conditions while depopulation — catching, loading, transport, and slaughter — receives less scrutiny despite causing severe acute welfare impacts. Osteoporotic bones fracture during routine handling, and the distress of CO2 exposure at concentrations used commercially is substantial. Investing in trained catching teams, LAPS adoption, and welfare-conscious transport conditions can meaningfully reduce this acute suffering. Hen rescue programmes, which rehome laying hens as backyard pets, offer an alternative that avoids slaughter suffering entirely for small numbers of birds.