Henopause, a
portmanteau
A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of words[hen
Hen commonly refers to a female animal: a female chicken, other gallinaceous bird, any type of bird in general, or a lobster. It is also a slang term for a woman.
Hen or Hens may also refer to:
Places Norway
*Hen, Buskerud, a village in Ringer ...](_blank)
" and "
menopause
Menopause, also known as the climacteric, is the time in women's lives when menstrual periods stop permanently, and they are no longer able to bear children. Menopause usually occurs between the age of 47 and 54. Medical professionals often d ...
", is sometimes used to refer to the point at which
hens stop laying
egg
An egg is an organic vessel grown by an animal to carry a possibly fertilized egg cell (a zygote) and to incubate from it an embryo within the egg until the embryo has become an animal fetus that can survive on its own, at which point the a ...
s.
Description
Although daily egg production starts to tail off after one year old, it may continue until 5–7 years old. Older hens gradually produce fewer eggs, and the eggs are usually larger. Since the average lifespan of a pet layer hen is 8–15 years, henopause has received attention as a potential problem for backyard or
urban chicken farmers who are eventually faced with the decision to either slaughter older layers or
keep them as non-producing pets. In the UK, the
British Hen Welfare Trust
The British Hen Welfare Trust (formerly the Battery Hen Welfare Trust) is the United Kingdom's first registered charity solely for laying hens. It was founded in April 2005 by Jane Howorth, and was established in order to raise awareness of th ...
charity rescues commercial hens who would otherwise be sent to slaughter when they become no longer commercially viable.
[Mace, Jenny L., and Andrew Knight. 2024. "From the Backyard to Our Beds: The Spectrum of Care, Attitudes, Relationship Types, and Welfare in Non-Commercial Chicken Care" Animals 14, no. 2: 288]
10.3390/ani14020288
/ref>
As many breeds of hen have been selectively bred for maximum egg production (300+ per year versus an ancestral 12 per year), many hens continue to lay for long periods, but may start to experience health complications such as egg yolk peritonitis (where the egg does not exit the body and thus causes fatal infections). Increasingly, those caring for chickens as pets may not have the expectation of eggs; some may even feed their hens' eggs back to them or even hormonally implant their hens to prevent egg-laying, which is purported to offer welfare benefits for the hens.
Complications in keeping an affected hen
In commercial farming, a layer hen is considered no longer commercially viable at around thirteen months and is called a "spent hen".
See also
* Forced molting
References
Chickens
Eggs (food)
Egg farming
Menopause
Poultry farming
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