In Japanese commercial hatcheries when chicks are born, trained sex spotters divide them into males and females. This is known as chicken sexing. The divided groups are treated differently. The females are fed because they will produce eggs; a few males are fattened for meat while the rest are deemed useless and early on meet a fate later encountered by all animals in a factory system.Under pressure from the production line, the chicken sexer must almost instantly choose the correct bin for each chick, a difficult task as cockerels and females look almost exactly the same. Differences appear only after four to six weeks of age.
