I'm not saying it's true one way or the other, but I could see a few reasons hatcheries wouldn't pursue...
They send the cockerels for meaties. They use them as "packing peanuts". They send them out to zoos, suffocated in a bag, to feed the animals (I used to volunteer at 1). Then what would they do with the eggs, that would create a whole other challenge. And the man hours spent sexing eggs in addition to then having to sex chicks seems counter intuitive.
I usually try to look at both sides of the story and consider why people or businesses do what they do.
I do think this is a great project. I love to see the experimenting. Is anyone using sex link type chicks or auto sexing to get results instantly? Sorry I haven't read the whole thread and now I'm looking for a little instant gratification...
If and WHEN I do incubate I will be trying out this method. I swear I have so many records, I don't know what to do with them all.
Although all of my set eggs were round, now that the final results are in I wound up with more cockerels. (So what else is new?) Out of 17 hatched eggs, I got 7 pullets. The only shining stars were my California Greys who produced only three boys from 11 eggs. I may try hatching some of their eggs again.
I separated what I thought were the sexes then kept hearing crowing from the pullet pens.
As far as hatcheries using extra males as packing peanuts, not all do, and breeds which are meaties the hatcheries would prefer more males or they wouldn't care.
And there really isn't much use for the cockerels of the smaller breeds which are high in egg production.
From what I've read Germany is perfecting ways to sex developing eggs but at this point I believe it is too time consuming and too expensive.
