An end to male chick culling? Israeli hens 1st in world to lay eggs of females only

In a dramatic breakthrough with the potential to avoid destroying 7 billion unwanted male chicks globally each year, a gaggle of Israeli hens all called Golda become the first in the world to lay eggs that only produce females.

The technology has been in development for seven years. Embryology expert Yuval Cinnamon headed a team at the Israeli Agricultural Research Organization Volcani Center, in partnership with Poultry by Huminn, a company that provides technological solutions to the poultry industry.

Roosters carry the Z chromosome while hens carry Z for males and W for females. The coupling of two Zs leads to a male chick being born. If the mother supplies the W chromosome to the father’s Z, a female chick will emerge. The research team discovered a way to genetically edit the hen’s Z chromosome so that eggs carrying male embryos will stop developing at an early stage and will not hatch.

The discovery has the potential to prevent hatching and elimination of male chicks by unsavory methods that range from suffocation and gassing to being ground up while still alive.

Cinnamon tells The Times of Israel that the European Union has already confirmed that the hens and table eggs can be marketed without any regulatory change. He adds that the US FDA is currently evaluating the research and that he hopes it, and Israel’s Agriculture Ministry, will approve the tech too.