Perching is a fundamental behavioural need for laying hens that is denied in conventional cage systems. Providing perches dramatically improves welfare and reduces injury.
The denial of perches to caged hens represents a textbook case of welfare failure through ignoring a powerful biological drive. Hens are strongly motivated to roost at height — a behaviour that in the wild provides predator protection and is deeply embedded in their neurobiology. Hens given the choice consistently choose perches over ground-level resting. Beyond the motivational frustration, the absence of perches contributes to bone weakness through reduced locomotive loading, making fractures during handling — a near-universal end-of-life welfare event — more severe. Perches are cheap, structurally simple, and profoundly welfare-beneficial. Their absence from conventional cage systems is a choice, not a necessity.