A facility where eggs, especially of fish or poultry, are artificially incubated and hatched.
From hatch plus the suffix -ery (place of activity). Hatch comes from Middle English hacchen, possibly from Old English *hæccan. The -ery suffix creates nouns indicating places where specific activities occur, like bakery or brewery.
Hatcheries represent humanity's attempt to optimize nature's reproductive processes, often achieving far higher survival rates than natural breeding. The word perfectly combines the ancient process of hatching with industrial-scale production, reflecting our complex relationship with domesticating natural cycles.
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