Cruelty Exposed at Nation’s Second and Third Largest Egg Producers

A new undercover investigation by The Humane Society of the United States exposes shocking cruelty to millions of hens confined in battery cages at the second and third largest egg producers in the nation – Rose Acre Farms and Rembrandt Enterprises, Inc.



Hidden camera video recorded at the Iowa facilities reveals:

  • Broken bones: Workers roughly yanking young hens (pullets) from their cages in the growing sheds and loading them into mobile cages for transport to battery cages, resulting in a mass of twisted bodies.
  • Extremely rough handling: Workers pulling young hens from the mobile cages and stuffing them into battery cages.
  • Cruel depopulation methods: Workers grabbing hens by their legs, then cramming them into gassing carts where they were killed with carbon dioxide.
  • Prolapsed uteruses: Hens suffering from “blow-outs” that went unnoticed and untreated due to the cage crowding.
  • Trapped birds unable to reach food and water: Battery cages can trap hens by their wings, necks, legs and feet in the wire, causing other birds to trample them, usually resulting in slow, painful deaths.
  • High mortality in layer and pullet sheds: Dead young hens, some of them mummified (meaning they’d rotted, dried-up and shriveled), were discovered in cages.
  • Failure to maintain manure pits: According to one worker, the manure pit under a pullet shed had not been cleaned in two years. Rose Acre workers claimed that some hens are blinded because of excessive ammonia levels.
  • Abandoned hens: Some hens manage to escape from their cages and fall into the manure pits below.
  • Injuries from overcrowding: Rembrandt confines six to seven hens in each battery cage. Smaller or weaker hens are often trampled by others.
  • Broken bones: Workers sometimes slam shut battery-cage doors on birds’ wings, legs and necks, causing broken bones.
  • Lengthy transport: Rembrandt does not kill “spent” hens on site but rather trucks them to a Minnesota slaughter plant. As a result, the birds are violently yanked from their battery cages, confined in mobile cages and trucked to the plant.

This is not a matter of a couple rotten eggs of the industry, but rather standard industry practices that are simply rotten. As investigation after investigation has shown, this cruelty is pervasive throughout the entire battery-cage egg industry. It’s time for an end to cage confinement of laying hens.

4012117633_1c3d8d0582.jpgOhioans have a special opportunity this year to outlaw the cruel confinement of hens in battery cages. Ohioans for Humane Farms is currently collecting the 403,000 valid signatures needed to place a modest initiative on this November’s ballot, which, among other things, would require that hens used for egg production be given enough space to stand up, turn around, lie down and extend their limbs and wings. If passed, this important initiative would reduce the suffering of over 26 million hens in the state each year.

Consumers nationwide can also take immediate action to prevent the suffering of egg-laying hens by removing eggs from their diets and replacing them with cruelty-free vegan alternatives.