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That's exactly right. Egg and broiler operations are in virtually every state but SW Missouri and NW Arkansas have a huge concentration of egg factories and broiler factories.
The egg factory birds are in pretty rough shape when they're done. They lay eggs for 10 to 14 months and sometimes forced to molt enmasse and go for another round of egg laying. In either case when the daily egg count starts to cross the line compared to feed input the entire hen house is packed in crates and off to the processor for soup.
Whether broiler or egg operation, when you pass farms down there that have the large chicken sheds 2, 3 or 4 of them in a row maybe 150' long, you might think wow that farmer has a lot of chickens.
Those birds aren't even owned by the farmer. The big producers like Cargill, Tyson, George's, Meeks, MOARK, provide the birds and the feed. It's up to the farmer to try to get the most eggs per pound of feed or meat per pound. If they get a good ratio, they get another batch and so-on. If they don't they're out of business.
Those same companies operate their own feedmills, hatcheries, growout facilities and processing plants. Sometimes one hatchery company will supply several of them.
Wherever there's a large concentration of chicken farms there are large feedmills, hatcheries and processors to support them.
I worked in the feedmill industry for a while automating them. The entire operation from the time the grain and feed additives come into the mill by rail or truck is automated. The scales, dumpchutes, elevators, hammermills, mixers, enzymes, medications, formulas are all automated. 24 hours a day 7 days a week it's a steady stream of ingredients coming into the mill and every morning literally a lineup of trucks taking bulk feed out to the individual farms.
Another group of trucks makes the rounds picking up spent birds - the entire flock, sometimes as many as 50 to 100 thousand - taking them to the processing plant. The processors is another story into itself I won't get into.
There is no attention to individual birds - it's just tons of feed into the bldg vs. lbs. of eggs/meat out of the bldg.
Ever wonder why you can't produce eggs for 1.29 a dozen? Or why you can't buy broiler chicks, raise them and butcher them for 1.09 a pound? They really do have an amazing operation.
I don't like it but apparently the general public wants eggs and meat in a neat styrofoam pack for that price regardless.
I did rescue one hen one time. I was driving behind one of those trucks taking the hens to the soup plant. One of the cages was broken and a hen blew out. I stopped and picked it up. It was missing lots of feathers, had no interest in walking or flying. It was in SW MO where my brother lives so I took it to his farm and my sister-in-law kept it and nursed it back to health.
