sexing

1. 1
   noununcountable

   The process of working out whether a young bird, usually poultry, is male or female.

   Accurate sexing of day-old chicks lets hatcheries separate the future layers from the males.

   The hatchery hires specialists whose sexing is almost never wrong.

   Note

   Hatchery talk usually treats it as a mass noun, with no article: accurate sexing, the sexing of chicks. The plural sexings exists for counting separate determinations, but it is the less common use. When you want a verb instead, use the -ing form of the verb sex, which takes the bird as a direct object: they are sexing the chicks.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of sex.

   The technicians are sexing day-old poultry on the production line.

   By noon she was sexing birds faster than anyone on the team.

   Note

   One -ing spelling does double duty in the verb. It builds progressives (the team is sexing chicks), and as a gerund it names the activity itself (sexing takes practice). With an animal as its object, it means telling male from female, the same work named by the hatchery noun. In US colloquial speech the same form can also mean having sex, so the object and the setting usually decide which reading is meant.

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