The lairage period before slaughter is a high-risk welfare time for poultry. Temperature management, handling, and waiting time all affect welfare significantly during this phase.
Poultry lairage welfare represents a critical welfare window that affects millions of birds daily. Thermal management, minimizing wait times, and adopting stunning methods that allow birds to be rendered insensible before the most distressing phases of handling all reduce suffering significantly. Controlled atmosphere stunning, where birds are rendered unconscious in their crates before any manual handling, represents the highest-welfare available slaughter approach.