Hundreds of Thousands of Hens Are Given a More Humane Death

April 2002

Egg producer Cypress Farms went bankrupt and abandoned more than a million hens in Florida and Georgia, leaving them to starve for 12 days before a court-appointed trustee and the departments of agriculture began efforts to kill the survivors. PETA contacted the company conducting the gas killings and sent them information on the use of a gas mixture using argon instead of carbon dioxide, which has been shown to cause suffering in the birds. After receiving our materials and discussing the situation with us, the company switched to an argon-based mixture for the remaining hens, meaning that hundreds of thousands of birds suffered far less as they were euthanized.