One reason there’s a chicken shortage? Disappointing roosters

The meat processor, which sells poultry along with beef and pork, said that its chicken volumes have been low in part because the roosters it uses for breeding are not meeting expectations.

“Quite frankly, we made a bad decision,” said Donnie King, Tyson’s chief operating officer and group president of poultry, during an analyst call on Monday.

The company had an “unexpected decline” in hatchings earlier this year because of the type of roosters it used, King explained.

Tyson chose the type because of certain characteristics that improved its offspring chicken’s quality for meat, Gary…