The short lives of most farm animals raise profound welfare questions about what constitutes adequate welfare consideration for beings who are killed young.
The truncated lives of farm animals raise welfare questions that go beyond conditions of confinement and handling. Even if a farm animal's short life were spent in good conditions, the prevention of the full natural lifespan represents a profound welfare consideration. A broiler chicken killed at 6 weeks cannot experience the full range of behavioral development, social bonding, and life experiences that a chicken living a natural 10-year lifespan would. Whether the right to a complete lifespan is a welfare consideration or an ethical consideration separate from welfare is debated in animal ethics. Within the welfare framework, the brevity of life means every moment of suffering is a greater proportion of the total life lived, and the provision of genuinely positive welfare experiences within that short life becomes more urgent, not less. Animals who live only weeks or months deserve maximally good welfare within that limited time.