Around 45 million freshly hatched male chicks are killed in Germany every year, as they do not lay eggs and produce only little meat for fattening. The killing of day-old male chicks will be banned by law from January 1, 2022, which means that all hatched male chicks must also be reared. In order to still be able to act economically, some farmers are already focusing on dual-purpose chickens. Although these lay comparatively fewer eggs than pure laying breeds, they also produce more meat than them, so that the males can go into fattening. This offers great opportunities for indigenous chicken breeds. These have not been considered for egg production by the majority of poultry farmers due to their lower laying performance.

This topic was also discussed on August 18 and 19, 2021, at the annual meeting of the Dual-Use Chicken/Free-Range Poultry Advisory Platform at Haus Düsse. Among other things, various projects on dual-purpose chickens were presented there, including a project on the native Sundheim chickens, where females can lay up to 180 eggs a year and males can reach a weight of up to 3.5kg.

You can read more details about the decree in the notice from the federal government. More information about native chicken breeds can be found here.