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Pecking order
4 February 2010
Peter Lennox keeps chickens, and they have taught him a great deal about behaviour, ethics, evolution and the psychopathic nature of modern 'efficiency'
All chickens are not born equal. If a few more philosophers had had a little more empirical interaction with chickens, John Locke may have reconsidered his notion of tabula rasa, the idea of the incipient individual as a blank slate embarking on a course of self-authorship. Chickens are born with certain personality traits, and these endure in a remarkably stable fashion throughout their lifespans (which can be as long as 15 years).
Of course, chickens are not born fully mentally formed - you can watch them learn by discovery, doing, copying and sometimes even adapting and improving. Eventually, older ones end up teaching younger ones. You don't see that in the battery farm, but put some in the garden and you soon do.
Watching chickens is a very old human pastime, and the forerunner of psychology, sociology and management theory. Sometimes understanding yourself can be made easier by projection on to others. Watching chickens helps us understand human motivations and interactions, which is doubtless why so many words and phrases in common parlance are redolent of the hen yard: "pecking order", "cockiness", "ruffling somebody's feathers", "taking somebody under your wing", "fussing like a mother hen", "strutting", a "bantamweight fighter", "clipping someone's wings", "beady eyes", "chicks", "to crow", "to flock", "get in a flap", "coming home to roost", "don't count your chickens before they're hatched", "nest eggs" and "preening".
You'll even see that the boss cockerel tends to take possession of the highest point - the top of the heap. And the longer you watch chickens, the more you think of them as people rather than some strange alien species with feathers, beady eyes and a strange language. Squint a little as you watch them enact their various roles and you can see a brood of Sainsbury's retail managers jockeying to maintain position.
Keeping chickens may not be the most efficient way to source eggs, of course, but then it depends on what is being measured. I benefit from eggs, mobile garden ornaments, endless amusement and companionship; I even learn from them. My nine-year-old budding evil-scientist son has learnt that evolution can go down as well as up, and that ground-feeding birds can, over generations, get larger and lose the ability to fly. He also discovered that rigging up a chicken catapult baited with corn can improve individuals' flying skills, but is not likely to reverse the evolutionary trend and is very likely to get you into trouble. Fair enough: he also learnt to take care of them and understand their preferences and behaviour; he teaches them things, and they patiently go along with it as long as some tasty titbit is part of the deal.
Put that way, keeping chickens is a lot more efficient than driving to the supermarket for eggs of unknown heritage. Ours are great eggs with big golden-orange yolks that sit like perfect hemispheres in the pan. Hardly surprising, as these are gourmand chickens: they eat what we eat (chicken excepted, of course). They like sweetcorn, peas, pasta and rice. They love steak and cooked bacon rind. In the course of evolution, I don't know where chickens developed a taste for cooked pig. Maybe a freak accident: a bolt of lightning; a forest fire; an unfortunate pig ... They also like prawns, salmon, cake and bread, and ironically are rather partial to sage and onion stuffing. They are also fans of strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, gooseberries, carrot tops, cabbage leaves, grass, shoots - especially the ones you've just planted. And they turn all this rather efficiently into eggs and excrement.
Chickens don't spend a lot of time theorising about efficiency, or devising best-practice feeding strategies to maximise resource utilisation, nutrition uptake and product throughput. But if you think humans invented fast food, you should watch chickens demolish a plate of cooked vegetable peelings. Are they silly, fussy, defenceless creatures? For a worm, woodlouse or a small frog, they are huge, fast and efficient predators. It all depends on your point of view.
What's life like to a chicken? Does their world look similar to mine? Is their green, with apologies to Richard Gregory, the same as mine? Is a chicken's life simpler than mine? More fun? More or less fulfilling?
It depends which chicken. For a chicken "in the wild" (are there any now?), life may be interesting, exciting and quite short. For a battery hen, it's stressful yet boring, and definitely short: a year of gainful employment as an egg factory, then redundancy (death). A chicken bred for eating would have an uninteresting life of 12 to 20 weeks.
For a free-range hen, it's probably quite nice, peaceful, interesting even. For a pet hen, complete with a name, it's a cosseted life: guaranteed food and water, protection from predators, plenty of space, time to relax, the opportunity to spread your wings, take a dust bath, sunbathe a little, explore a bit, look for a hole in the fence, raid the vegetable garden, go and watch the funny humans with their endless activity for activity's sake.
But it's really out of your hands (claws) which kind of chicken you are - miserable and short-lived or lucky and long-lived. In the lottery of evolutionary niches, some species got to be fast, powerful and sharp. Humans got the mental wherewithal to try to control everything; the chicken's future rested on being tasty. Chickens are thus relieved of an enormous responsibility, making their lives simpler. They don't have to organise the whole world, or attend meetings to discuss policies "going forward"; they don't have to invent the future continually - it just comes when it comes.
Chickens have hierarchies, of course, but not as high as Mount Everest, with the top cockerel sitting up in the stratosphere. They form small, manageable hierarchies and politics is a simple matter: "When I come into contact with another chicken, what is our relative status?" The lower-status chicken moves away, ceding the morsel of food or best perching place. If they are of a similar status, they have to fight it out. The chicken at the bottom of the pecking order always has to let everyone else eat first, or must run in to steal and risk being viciously pecked. (Even the nice, docile, mild-mannered, fat old brown hen will throw a jab at the poor bottom-of-the-ladder chicken; bullying isn't just the property of a single bully.)
As a chicken, you don't have to better yourself; you just need to find your place. A chicken doesn't have to be ambitious or worry about realising its potential and getting on in life.
Is a chicken's life somehow less fulfilling, then? Is it anthropomorphic to say that hens find life more or less interesting? I'm told that battery farming isn't too bad because the chickens don't know any better (and it's not for long, anyhow); you can't miss what you never knew existed - the convenient concept of tabula rasa again. I'm sorry, but I can spot a happy chicken a mile off. Anyone who ever lived with chickens about the place wouldn't spout such rubbish.
From close, if hardly scientific, observation, I can report:
Chickens' environmental preferences and territoriality
They complain if I don't get up and let them out of the hen-house soon after dawn. They come and nag vociferously, even tapping on the back door, if they don't have enough water. Chickens are quite good at manipulating humans.
They spend a lot of time wandering around in the undergrowth, good for scratching up moss. They like a little sunbathing in the afternoon, weather permitting. They shelter from the rain and really, really don't like snow on the ground, standing on one leg by the back door and plaintively calling to be let into the house.
They like a handful of corn in the food hopper, but prefer to wander around pecking it. If I throw bread out, they spend a lot of time chasing each other, stealing bits from each other's beaks. Then they run off to try to consume it in peace. If they see another hen pick up a nice piece, they'll drop their own and chase after that one.
Sometimes a truce emerges; they compete vigorously until they've each got a decent piece, whereupon they scatter, going off a little way to consume it without having to defend it at every instant. But the truce can be upset by the arrival of a very competitive bird. Like uncooperative drivers in a traffic jam, they all dash for the advantage and end up worse off; the whole activity takes more effort and time.
Economic and management theorists subscribing to the view that unbridled competition offers the greatest efficiency should be made to watch chickens.
They have clear attitudes to territory (that's what a pecking order is all about, after all). They chase away pigeons; they also sometimes gang up on our collie dog. If a cat comes into the garden, they complain vehemently until I arrive to shoo it away; it's the same if a fox calls by at night to test my security arrangements.
Sometimes, if there's no cockerel, a bossier hen will assume the role, even being the first to leap to the defence of the brood at great personal risk. If a cockerel is subsequently introduced, a period of adjustment to the pecking order follows. A good cockerel enjoys droit de seigneur (frequently) but is a fierce and brave protector of the flock, putting himself between the threat and the hens, defending to the death if necessary. When tasty food is served he waits courteously for the hens to have their fill. A diffident cockerel is cold-shouldered by the hens.
Personality traits and behaviour
Some little groups stick together quite closely, while other individuals are more independent and go off by themselves.
Some breeds are flighty and nervous while others are calm, placid even. Some are aggressive and stroppy, yet occasionally the placid ones gang up on them and see them off. Smaller breeds like to roost and fly more often. Some breeds are more adventurous than others, some are less intelligent, some can be very tame, and others will never quite be. When we have several breeds, they tend to hang out with their own kind.
Inquisitiveness, teaching and learning
If I'm working in the garden, the chickens come, sit on the wall and watch. If I'm chopping logs, the tamer ones have a disconcerting tendency to hop on to the chopping block looking for tasty woodlice. They follow me into the shed and back out into the garage, through the side gate, tripping me up every time I turn, all the while murmuring and clucking softly. I think they may be reassuring me so I don't get spooked.
I've not heard of a functional magnetic resonance imaging study of mirror neurons in hens, but they do learn by copying each other. One hen makes a special, ungainly jump to get at the out-of-reach juicy berries - very comical. By the end of the week, they're all at it until the berries are gone. Next year, the technique is deployed straight away.
It's the same with finding out how to get over the fence in stages; a low wall, then on to the shed roof, along a bit then a short flight and a crash-landing in next door's garden. Once one does it, most of them can; the escape route will have to be sealed.
If you allow a mother hen to hatch some chicks (and not all hens are equally good at this - some just forget the eggs!), they suddenly develop a whole new vocabulary, teaching the chicks how to peck, scratch the ground and so on. Mother hens fuss endlessly; the chicks, initially clueless, learn rapidly. Chicks that have been reared in an incubator without a mother hen seem a lot more clueless, for a lot longer.
Hens that have lived the first year of their life in commercial intensive-farm environments are amazingly clueless when introduced to my garden. Sometimes they won't come out of the hen-house for the first day or two, even with the open door right in front of them. They don't know how to roost, and instead sit all night (and day) on the floor. Once they do get out, they don't know how to scratch and peck. However, once hens have become used to the outdoor life and the freedom of the garden, if they are left shut in the compartment (which is outdoors, with plenty of food and water), they insistently march up and down the fence or try repeatedly to fly over.
Now, I've hardly done much to refute charges of anthropomorphism - but am I bovvered? I'm not projecting human characteristics on to dumb animals - I'm saying I really don't see that much difference in their hopes and fears, behaviour and petty foibles. If one actually lives with chickens, it's a lot harder to treat them as mere objects.
Their preferences are astoundingly obvious, so what possible excuse could there be for giving them any less? If they like greens, why give them pellets? If they like sunbathing, why pack them into a tiny, noisy, smelly place with no natural light? If, as I suspect, the answer is something to do with the "efficiency" of food production, then the notion of efficiency is horrible, incompetent, brutalised and brutalising, and it's certainly not in the interests of chickens at all. And I'm not sure that our ethical notions are all that more advanced than chickens'.
All right, we could argue that they're only chickens, not people, and frankly, we're the top species so we call the shots - that's evolution, we're the winners and might makes right. So our notions of ethics extend only to "like me"? But how like is "like"? In the grand scheme of things, if we stand back and consider all the matter and energy we know of in the universe, we're a lot more similar to chickens than we are to almost everything else - all that rock and water, those suns, the endlessness of space and dark matter. Chickens are positively family.
In today's economic climate, efficiency and competitiveness are the guiding principles of business, of life; more product faster, while taking up less space. But are these concepts in our interests at all? Efficiency without ethics is psychopathic. And how much cleverer than chickens are we, ultimately?
So what do I get from chickens? Simple lessons like these: competition without co-operation is nonsense; you can't win by simply eradicating all the opposition - that's a pyrrhic victory. In life, winning really isn't everything - it isn't even anything. Taking part is all.
Reward and risk go hand in hand. The top cockerel has to take the biggest share of both. A flock can manage without a cockerel, but a cockerel without a flock is nothing.
A flock can keep you warm, inform you about dangers and advantages, and provide you with companionship; but you have to work at it.
Everyone should have a place in the pecking order. Strive for your place in life, not someone else's. Someone else's bread isn't necessarily tastier than your own. Envy will cost you dearly.
Don't let "flock-think" smother your own opinions; give yourself space to be an individual. Common sense is useful, but it's not always right. The society you're in may prompt you to behave badly, but only you can change that.
One could spend years on a moral philosophical quest, or keep chickens and treat them with courtesy and common sense. One doesn't just keep chickens, one lives with them. All chickens are not born equal, but they deserve equal respect.
Peter Lennox is senior lecturer in spatial perception in artificial environments and director of the Signal Processing and Applications Group, University of Derby.
Readers' comments
Peter, as a fellow ex-batts chicken owner, I'm pleased you've had such a positive experience keeping chickens.
However, I'm not afraid of 'breaking a few eggs' when making a point - chickens are in fact incredibly stupid. Their instincts might be sound but their intelligence is frighteningly low.
They are not worthy of such study; their purpose is to lay eggs (apart from my Hettie, she's different).
Might I suggest you get out a little more...and not to Kentucky Fried Chicken.
There's certainly a case to be made that chickens aren't the sharpest beak in the coop -- like when they're desperate to join their friends on the other side of the run fence and can't figure out to use the open door that's behind them.
On the other hand, our chickens know there's a hawk in the vicinity before we do. They freeze, and look up. When it comes into view, they run for cover. They're adept at finding the sunniest spots, and the dustiest. And it sure didn't take 'em long to figure out that our approach probably meant food.
And I prefer their company to that of many management consultants I've known.
Nice piece.
Hi - I'll grant you that they can be incredibly daft. I just reckon they're not so different to many folk in that respect. And look, stand back a bit, squint a bit, - they are brighter than rocks, cadmium, water, droplets of oil (whatever Chris Malcolm reckons) and most other things in the known universe. And a great deal more amusing than management consultants. And I think eggs are just a fortuitous byproduct. Mike - I don't really study them... well alright, I suppose I do. Beats the hell out of validations and timetable amendment forms. I suppose I do need to get out more.
Oh, one more thing - the modern, high-yielding, bred-for-eggs breeds are a great deal more docile, and yes, dimmer - than more wild, flighty, old-fashioned breeds
Now, if only we could breed academics that way...
You could be on to something. Why stop at breeding? Battery farmed academics. Put them in a small, secure environment (ok, cages). Give them lots of food, light and warmth - with no distractions (Starbucks, Radio 4). I bet it would double their research output. Ok, they might lose a few feathers, and be a bit irritable, but quite a few are already. Then, after a year of high productivity,...
I think you have to de-beak them. After their productivity period, their meat will be a bit tough, so some recipe involving long slow cooking: "professeur-au-vin". Or dog food.
Thank-you for an amusing and informative piece on your chicken keeping experience. I am appalled at the current chicken keeping practices of industry to such an extent that I am currently practicing veganism. I encourage others to do the same. May I suggest the book - 'The Pig Who Sang to the Moon' by Jeffrey Masson. Thanks.
your insights are dead on. as someone who kept a flock for years as a hobby I would say you put virtually every observation ive ever had to paper. they really are wonderfully interesting social animals,
I would routinely sit and smoke a cigar, drink a beer and watch them wonder and scratch in the yard and drive. I found it to be my ¨zen¨ time and it would routinely fascinate me and help me throw off the preoccupations of the day, work and life.
also I would call them my little raptor dinosours, because I would hate it for any mouse unfortunate enough to be cought out in the open by my roving flock. he would be hunted down mercillessly.
once he was dispatched the pel mel struggle to keep the prize was allways an exiting show
Your piece is spot on. Those who regard chickens as stupid haven't spent time observing them, or have watched chickens confined to a pen.
Our chickens range freely over our acreage. We have 70 birds of all ages including 5 roosters. They separate naturally into "harems" which the roosters protect in a surprising altruistic manner. With so much room we rarely see squabbling, fighting or pecking among the birds.
I compared these natural characteristics to learning in this piece a few years ago http://homeedmag.com/HEM/252/freerangelearning.html
I also can't help but agree with rumcrook, watching chickens is zen time. We've given chickens away to at least ten families (gateway animals to more serious farming) and they report back they can't help but sit nearby, mellowing amongst their fowl friends.
www.lauragraceweldon.com
I don't know much about chickens but I do know you have to be really intelligent to understand the behaviour of honey bees.
Having 3 hens and a rooster on our property in the unfenced Tasmanian bush, it was instructive to observe over time that 1 of the 4 (the smallest hen) was the only one to develop sufficient skill to survive in the bush and basically become feral.
She provided us with 2 or 3 eggs per year in her latter days, until eventually she never returned from (or couldn't reach) her nocturnal perch in the trees. Probably a Tassie Devil got her in the end.
A most instructive "pet". I've cannot imagine buying cage eggs again.
What a wonderful article - a friend e mailed it to me. Our 38 chickens and 1 very busy cockerel are indeed gourmand chickens. In addition to many of the items listed ours also get some Sainsburys Blend Whiskey when there is ice on their water!! They are very keen on sliced water melon. You may have seen pictures and articiles about me and my dealings with Defra last year - Letter of the Week in Country Life in September then pictures and articles in the Telegraph, Mail (two), SUN and the local Dorset papers.
@prof. Eykyn - I would indeed like to see you articles! - on the subject of busy cockerels - has anyone come across the joke about that, supposedly made by president roosevelt? Oh, and by the way, has anyone observed the courting behaviour of cockerels? - I quite like the little sidestep shuffle approach. Larry - I had noticed that lighter, flightier breeds prefer to roost up trees rather than in the hen house. @laura - I'd like to look at that article on freerangelearning! - and yes, it does appear that more people should have chickens, just to get some balance in life. Regards
peter
I love this article. What a great way to argue for humane methods of raising animals for food. Your chickens sound a lot like my dog!
Does anyone keep dogs/cats together with chickens, and if so do they lie down together in love et peace - or what?
@deborah - thanks. In a sense, I was arguing with the idea of dominion and of 'separateness'. If we don't think we're so different, why should we exercise some natural right to 'dominion' over these neghbours of ours? And it's certainly dawning on us that we're not as independent of our surroundings as we sometimes like to believe. regards
How can we compare chicken with man?Chicken`s brain is not developed just like man.Chicken may behave cooperative base es but man`s developed brain have some positive advantage as well as some negative drawback.Can chicken have conscious idea of death or strong survival instinct so strong just like man?What may be man doing murder, , rape, conquer or loot another` s property all positive or negative deed he do only because fear of a death or say survive in any condition and any how. Man`s all ethics is based on selfishness.All chaos in man`s world created by this survival instinct and his developed brain.and there is not solution for his fate
I'm afraid that we can indeed compare them - even if they are not the same. Yes, chickens have strong survival instincts (and do strenuously try to avoid death), yes cockerels do rape, yes, chickens do kill each other (especially in battery conditions). There are differences and similarities - we can learn from both.
I think you would be delighted to know that there is a chicken paradise place on this Earth where chicken live out in the open and in peace, free from want and predators, where the foliage is lush, the weather balm and people do not interfere: it is Waimea State Park in Kauai, HI. This gorgeous nature preserve got inhabited by chicken escaping when hurricane Iniki badly hit the island in 1992 - and since they turn out to be non-disruptive for the nature balance the park management will not bother about eradicating them.
The only problem that the chicken present there is for a backpack hiker who likes to sleep late at some beautiful remote place - and is roused early by an odd cockerel
I have six chickens (from three different breeds) in my backyard coop and they are a delight. When they are laying eggs, they are affectionate and interested in humans. They squat down to be pet when I come near, they hover around me and call out for me to visit their area. They are also happy to be with each other. When a hen is not laying eggs, I can immediately tell--she is mean to others, standoffish, and prefers to go off by herself. I'm not sure what lesson is to be learned from this, though I have tried to make broad claims about their mothering instincts kicking in, only to feel pretty silly for humanizing my chickens.
If anyone wants a reality check on the intelligence of chickens, come by my house around 6pm when Evangeline has escaped the coop (again) right before roosting time. She ends up having to roost on top of the water heater and get rained on all night unless I physically move her back to her dry coop.
What I really enjoy about keeping chickens is the pleasure of raising my food from scratch, and raising it kindly and joyfully. (The economics work out too--I end up making a little money selling my eggs to the farmer's market.) My chickens are incredibly happy, which makes me happy. And yes, the cat and dog love the chickens. The cat hangs out in their area most of the day. They pretty much ignore him.
It really is a chicken paradise on the island of Kauai. Everywhere on the island there are feral chickens living in little family groups. They are a mixture of various breeds and are beautiful beyond belief. They were the best thing about Kauai!
Wonderful article, enjoyed and agree with so much. I live in the city and chickens are illegal here (it's a dumb political story). But I have 5 in my backyard (don't tell anyone), no rooster of course. And since we can anthropomorphise them perhaps we should! I've named them all Albert (Albert Schwietzer, Albert Einstein, Fat Albert, and just Albert and Albert). It doesn't matter because I don't need to call them. They just come as soon as they hear me approach. What more acceptance and affirmation could I possibly ask for in life! My dog loves them too. He's fairly adept as a chicken herder. And they tolerate his nosing them around. They are a great joy to have about.
My daughter had a chick hatch in her hands, in the car on the way home from "rescuing" all the not-quite-right chicks from the 3rd grade hatching project. Sweet moment.
We have many stories of heroic roosters, one of whom went from being named Boy M to Sir Millfleur for his valour in action.
Currently there's a bobcat who has decimated my flock. It's a tough decision- would you rather have a well-fed bobcat on your porch, or wake up to a young rooster crow-off?
chicken intelligence: I wonder if you have seen this chicken police video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybVb3t560oY
Thank you for the beautifully written and observant article! Owning many bantams and a few standard chickens, as well as some ducks and guinea fowl, I've come to a lot of the same conclusions as you. People can argue all they'd like that chickens have no intelligence, but I've seen chickens do some pretty interesting and amazing things at times. And really, isn't the concept of "intelligence", as we define it, a rather arbitrary value in the grand scheme on things?
Few things in life are more pleasurable to me than sitting and watching the chickens forage and interact and do all of their chicken-y things. Puts quite a few things in perspective.
I've been a vegetarian since birth, but if I hadn't been I certainly would have become one spending time with these wonderful animals. I'll likely never buy battery hen eggs again.
Thanks again for the great article.
Is the distinction betwen negative and contrapositive really lost on the Times Higher Education supp?
The joke was made by President Coolidge (not Roosevelt), and thereafter the increased 'vigour' of a male with a new female has been called the 'Coolidge effect'.
You can find the joke at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coolidge_effect
Zoe, thanks. Kenneth - I'm sorry, I'm a bit dense tonight - whilst I grasp the distinction, I haven't spotted the relevance? Kristin - I have to say, I'm not a vegetarian - in fact, when a fox killed my bossy, stroppy and noisy hen, Flo, we didn't want to waste her, so we ate her! It was with some trepidation, and, to be honest, she was old and rather tough, so long slow cooking was required. But we reckon she had a good life and she actually died trying to fight off the fox that broke in to the henhouse.
Chickens are intelligent unless it has to do with something unnatural, like a fence or door. Silkies are the worst, if I put the food bowl behind one, they can't find it. But I have to say that my broody silkie has an intelligence all her own; she was sitting on an egg, and went for a bite to eat from the feeder, and rolled the egg over to the feeder with her!
I absolutely loved. I keep chickens myself. About a hundred of them running around in the yard. Thank you so much.
Sounds like 'bird brain' should be a compliment.
Neat critique of efficiency of production but, as yet,chickens have not learned how to take care of those at the bottom of the pecking order. Knowing ones place in the world is fine if it is a comfortable place but the analogy is based on a species that ranks place in the pecking order by physical attributes and 'natural' relations of dominance, subservience and flock bullying. While this may resemble our playgrounds, how would a disabled chicken fare left to the flock? I'm all for removing productivity from chicken (and human) evolution but it is not a question of restoring 'natural order' to human ethics. Or if it is, life for disabled 'chickens' would ' naturally' be bothbrutal and short.
Thoughtful and insightful article and comparisons between human behavior and intellect.
It puts in perspective many observations over the years. Am somewhat surprised by Ramesh Raghuvanshi view that chickens don't perhaps have a survival instinct.I have seen free range chickens about to be slaughtered chased for hours by several people in a bid to hand on to life.
Good piece Peter Lennox!
We had chickens back in the old country and they were an essential part of life. They definitely are intelligent with sharp instincts.
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What a great piece! We've kept a small flock for more than twenty-five years, and it is great fun, especially with children (and now) grandchildren around. Just one small observation regarding Julie's comment, though. I take it you don't have a rooster? That's probably why your hens "squat down to be pet" when you come around.
Next, let's hear it for turkeys. They, too, are much maligned and misunderstood.
Lovely article, Dr. Lennox, thank you for writing it!
Mike, chickens are not at all stupid! Their intelligence is appropriate to their natural environment and survival needs. It would be pointless for them to be able to do math or surf the web or launch a space rocket because they are chickens and care about chicken things.
They are smart enough to know to demand help from a creature they observe to be willing to bring them good things. They exhibit empathy and care for one another, a form of intelligence. They can read human intentions simply from looking at the face. Considering how vulnerable they are to predators from air and land, their ability to survive is remarkable and, oh yes, intelligence-based.
WastingtonDC: The comments on islands ruled by feral chickens reminds us of Key West, Fla, where the humans are divided among those who would cull the gazillion feral cockerels that torture every hearing human with their personal rendition of sunrise, in all the hours prior to dawn, and the rest of us. The same goes for our islands of feral Peafowl, south of Houston Texas, North of the River, in Portsmouth, Virginia, and in upscale millionaire's lairs all over Southern Californication. Those of us who love the Peafowl's screech, comparable to sounding a VW bus horn, two inches from ones hung over head, in a small room, build high safe structures that our bludge of bureaucrats cannot define to be roosts, and the birds take over them instantly, squawking loudly every time a stranger steps on the property they have taken charge of. God Bless the chicken keepers, and may those who outlaw our backyard hens, fail to prosper, or get their next fat step increase.
Thanks for this article!! We inherited Eurydice, an elderly, Black Orpington when my husband's cousin moved house - and hastily acquired a friend to keep her company ("Athena"). Yhey live at leisure in our backgarden and work the forest verges of the shrubbery to and fro each morning, and then spend the afternoons soaking up the sun and conversing with each other.. They use, of their own choice about a sixteenth of an acre, and ignore the rest. We conclude that they are not aware their world has any limits on it. Our Abyssinian cat took great interest at first and launched a full scale stalk and pounce, until, at the moment of pounce, she realised that these beast were huge. The dogs ignore them.
Our hen house has stained glass windows. I kid you not.
A great read! I recently decided that my online comic story needs some back yard chickens, and this article definitely supports my instinct to give the chickens more character. Thanks! (at latercomics.com)
Hi Peter, would you explain this point to me. what would happen to a wingless chicken in the barnyard? I have a disabled son-he would not survive without the extra we put in. He cannot fly to the highest place to roost. What would your chickens do to him? I've seen birds with their feathers pecked off (or who have pecked off their own). The article is great but I feel you are not accounting for the weaker chickens in the roost but who may still have lots to offer
I think we can indeed draw some insights about the human condition by looking at other social animals and I greatly enjoyed this post. However I can understand how one might accuse you of advocating social darwinism, especially with the "Everyone should have a place in the pecking order". Personally I took that to mean one should understand their limits and their abilities and not try to make themselves into something they are not like say a young woman who is almost savant like in mathematical ability falling into depression because she is unable to become the next Lindsay Lohan.
Also there is no point in comparing humans with rocks or cadmium. They don't have any level of intelligence or decision making. So while chickens have more in common with humans than rocks that has no bearing on how we related to them.
Chicken intelligence is important to note because we have the ability to evaluate our actions and create moral rules that are more than violence enforced behavior. We can spread ideas. And while Chickens are certainly informative as to animal group behavior we are not just animals but moral animals and chickens have little, but more than nothing, to tell us about ought.
Great story and a good way to live.I had 7 chickens but now only 4 hens and a Barred Rock Rooster "Brutus" that my brother Perry got.We have two Hampshire hensBrunhilda and Hildegaard, and a Barred Rock," Penny" and a Black Rhode Island red,"Esmerelda"I like seeing them on our 2 acres wandering around as in the story.Of course the eggs have deep orange or gold yokes.I didn't think as some people did that this narrative was supposed to be a lesson for people to be more like chickens, but maybe more understanding and reflective of their own nature.It makes for a homey and bucolic picture, at least thats how i see it in my own life.After my Dad died, six years ago, I moved out here from Houston and i like the pace of life and the darkness at night. *
@Great article but what about disabled chickens? - good point - and of course, no metaphor should be pushed too far. I'm not, of course, an expert on Chicken behavour (that's the point of the "Off-Piste" section) so I can only answer your question obliquely. I have noticed that, under certain circumstances, chickens can bully - and when they do, they look remarkably like human bullies. However, I've also noticed that, when there is enough space available, 'live and let live' is the order of the day - I've not seen hens go (far) out of their way to persecute another. It seems to me that the worst case scenario I've seen is where a hen simply doesn't really join the flock. But that's not such a bad thing, in the sense that some hens really do go off on their own - they don't form a tight knit band - which is probably what underpins my observation that they don't form ever-larger hierarchies. So, in my experience (which is, of course, outside the pressure-cooker environment of the intensively 'reared' chicken environment) each seems to be able to find her place.
@Sue Denim - I draw the distinction between the ambition to 'be all you can be' and the ambition to climb a steep hierarchy (constrained by the Peter Principle). In a sense, the holding down of the individual to be less than they could be is a product of steep hierarchies that feature much to-ing and fro-ing called 'politics'. On the comparison of chickens and people - the point I was making in distinguishing organic matter from all that other matter that inhabits the universe is simply that the differences betwen organisms pale in to insignificance compared to the similarities. Here, I know I run the risk of offending a great many people. It simply seems to me that the differnces are quantitative, rather than qualitative. I just don't buy the concept of the specialness of humans compared to the rest of the universe. I'm afraid I'm not altogether impressed by our capacity to "...evaluate our actions and create moral rules " - since we spend an awful lot of time and energy talking about it, but, push comes to shove, our capacity for ethics seems to come at a price: our capacity for UN-ethics. The time and energy we spend on organising conflicts, with a factory approach to conquering (including death, and usually under the banner of some supposedly moral justification) is remarkable. Of course, you could argue that chickens are less sinful only because they are too thick - fair enough. But, you could also say 'moral is as moral does' and that what we could learn from chickens is to place a great deal less score on intelligence and high moral pretensions, and just live and let live. Simples!
Peter, thank you so much for writing this! It's one of the most interesting things I've read on the internet for a very long time.
A vet once said to me that he hates it when people attribute human traits to animals (especially pets); this would be your "anthropomorphism". But after thinking about it a bit, I realised that if evolutionary adaptation could produce eyes multiple times through convergence, why would it not produce similar neurological patterns in the brains of various animals to deal with day-to-day existence? I assume my cat loves me, because he seeks me out and purrs when I stroke him and loves making me laugh; this is not anthropomorphism - it is simply recognition. To whatever degree a cat could be said to love, he does.
My personal theory is we will find a strong emotion/trait mapping to other "social" carnivores, since the evolutionary pressures have been fairly similar, demanding similar solutions.
Thanks for the great article. We're at the tail end of our first year with five hens in our suburban backyard farm. It has been a real education for the whole family and a genuine, unexpected joy. I'm surprised at the connection we've developed with them. They're not pets so much as partners in our little ecosystem of garden, yard and home.
http://www.yearofplenty.org/chicken-coop/
"A flock can manage without a cockerel, but a cockerel without a flock is nothing."
Cockerel Around The Flock: wasn't that by Bill Haley and The Cockets?
Or am I thinking of Cockerel Flock by Sir E.L.T. On-John, off of Don't Peck Me, I'm Only the Chicken Plucker:
Cockerel flocking
Is something rocking
When the coop just won't keep still
I never cocked me a better walk
Every bird must have its bill
Oh, Clucky Mama, those old cockfights
When Rooster pecked: his rivals' flight
And Cockerel flocking was o-o-o-ut of si-i-i-ght...
Cluck, cluck-cluck-cluck-cluck-cluck...
You know, i have been having the same thoughts about efficiency and raising chickens. I guess due to recently paying more for cage free eggs. I just don't mind. I had a small flock of six last year to learn the ropes, and the dogs in the neighborhood ended up getting them all. They did get Clucky Lucky last. But now I can spend the effort and money fortifying my coop knowing that I am not the only one who doesn't measure the return in eggs and pounds of meat.
Dogs can be a problem (I even have to watch my own collie) and local cats can get a bit ambitious, too (although they've fat chance against an aggressive cockerel). Evil scientist son and I experiment with deterrents. A garden sprinkler, a water pistol and the kind of hose that has lots of tiny hole along its length, spread right along the fence that would normally be the escape route, can make a really hostile (albeit harmless) environment for would-be scavengers. A BB gun is quite good. We've thought of high amplitude high frequency sound, especially in discordant patterns mimicking screams but beyond our own hearing. Non-lethal electricity is a possible. The point is to use associationism, to make the place unwelcoming to potential predators.
One more thing, on the subject of how a flock treats the disabled hen - we had a one legged hen (fox) and she was fine, lived for years and no, she wasn't bullied.
Peter,
I just wanted to express my sadness upon reading the words "they eat what we eat (chicken excepted, of course)". If there is one thing I know from growing up watching and feeding the chickens at my families farm, it is this: a chickens favorite food is in fact chicken.
It is more than a little disturbing to see them fighting over the carcass of one of their former brethren, to be sure, but, as with most things, you get used to it after a while.
stupid,realy stupid,unreader friendly story, learn how to write
@ Jack Goodwin..."stupid,realy stupid,unreader friendly story, learn how to write" - and punctuate? and spell? and not invent words? and use the space bar on the keyboard? and learn how to construct an argument, or make a criticism incisive, yet amusing? - Are you, in fact, offering tuition in basic writing skills? What are your terms? Are you, in fact, an Orc or an agent of a foreign power, covertly operating toward destroying our basic language?
What a fun article, obviously written by someone who "gets" chickens. It's hard to imagine how one would ever feel the same about that carton of eggs in the grocery, after raising a home flock. Backyard chickens are truly an under-appreciated hobby; a simple pleasure that helps one reboot after dealing with the pace of modern life.
Excellent story. I never knew that chickens could be so interesting.
Thanks for the wonderful insights, Mr. Lennox. As a novice backyard chicken raiser (2 hens at present), we have noted most of the behaviors you and the other posts have said. What I love the best is when our chickens stand at the big glass windows so they can watch me cook in the kitchen, making soft clucking noises and occasionally pecking at the window if they see a particularly appetizing piece of food - and the funny way they put their heads down and run like Velociraptors towards the person who is holding out their bread or sunflower seeds or whatever!
Loved the article. It cheered me up after we had a hideous night in which an insane badger killed two of our girls.
We have Lohmann-Brown hens, bought from a free-range farm when they were 14 months old. And the last of our old flock, a black rock hen who is 6 years old. She has the run of the whole garden and has a great life. Liz, we have four cats as well as the hens. They are terrified of the hens! Inara enjoys chasing a cat or two now and again. The other were actually raised with a cat at the farm and would be friendly, but the cats are wary and keep their distance! Inara loves to sneak into the kitchen and steal the cats's food and they daren't stop her!
I'll pass this article onto my daughter, who is an MSc student in animal behaviour (and has a BSc in the same stubject). Thanks!
Ah! - one lives and learns - I never realised badgers were a problem! - And yes, black rocks aren't shy, retiring types!
Thank you for sharing your beautifully written piece which I enjoyed very much! I know that I will never be lonely when I get to my autumn years. I admire someone who observe life and live to the fullest. Thanks again. Hg
Thanks for the insights, and appreciative comments. jack goodwin -I just didn't get your comments, I'm afraid - but then, I don't pretend to understand werewolves; maybe you just hate the idea of us humans sympathising with chickens.
great story. i live in suburban australia and have hens and roosters, well above the permitted number. also have 2 cats and it is quite hilarious watching a rooster chase a cat around the back yard, both at full tilt
i sell the eggs at work and my boss says he wont buy supermarket eggs any more. they get leftovers from my co-workers dinners and lunches, a friend and i collect greens from the organic grocer and my neighbour and i collect weeds from the local gardens on our morning work
i have Cochins-which make great mums but they go broody at the drop of a hat, a Welsummer-good layer but hopeless mum and crosses between the two. also had a flock of chooks that were bred as battery hens but were purchased prior to that fate occurring. vaste quantities of eggs from them which tapers off as they get older. the others dont lay as often
Hi Peter, it is undoubtedly important to remember (and respect) the animal that we are and, I agree, some of the similarities are striking. I am also relieved to hear about your disabled hen although I remain troubled by the assumption that more space is a corrective to bullying. True, having more space may lessen the competition for chickens but humans are greedy like that-they fight over very tiny spaces, far removed from their 'barnyard in the name of abstract notions like democracy and demolish nations to make more room for 'development'. Humans compete for spatial limits and boundaries rather than the need to have more space as such.
Back to our disabled chicken. As stated I am relieved for your hen but my point was more to do with the question of finding ones 'natural place'' in the pecking order. Fine, if you like vertical hierarchy, are not at the bottom and trust the powers 'above' to have your interests at heart. So fine if you like paternalism. Not fine if you like more horizontal peer-relationships based on equality and difference-i.e valuing difference reciprocally rather than as an outsider or potential threat to group identity.
I don't think chickens can do this-lets face it very few humans are able to be honestly hospitable to difference or practice an ethics of singularity. But as you said, there are limits to how far you can push a metaphor.
Thanks for the article-I found it very thought provoking
Great article! As a keeper of 12 backyard chickens for the past 3 years, I have come from a position of ambivalence to one of love and appreciation for chickens. I find it enormously satisfying and soothing to watch them scratching the ground and softly clucking to one another when they are excited by some tasty tid-bits. Or hilarious when one day my small terrier had his head down a rat hole in the chicken run and a territorial chicken began jumping up and down on his back. That was a belly laugh!
Hi Peter - tremendous article, it's hard to find such insightful articles on the "humble" chicken. We live in suburban Melbourne, Australia and have had pet chickens for over five years. I completely agree that watching their antics puts you "in the moment", all worries and concerns vanish when just watch them.
The point I'd like to bring up is the debate on the intelligence of chickens and how it is manifested. We had a beautiful Silver-laced Wyandotte called Freebie (for obvious reasons) and she was by far the most demonstrably intelligent chicken I'd ever known. Her intelligence was shown by her ability to completely charm her humans into giving her the best food, special care when she was sick, attention and priority over the other chickens, which I might say also probably helped keep her at the bottom of the pecking order.
She would follow us around the garden and when we approached the raspberry vines or any other ripe foodstuff, she would sing to us so sweetly and reward our food gifts with more sweet songs and attention. She would also not "sob" if she found a nest of grubs as all the other chickens did which just served to get the unwanted attention and competition from all the others. Freebs would just quietly and efficiently devour the lot before the others even noticed. One particular impressive move was to place herself in the empty broody cage and sing to us when we sat down outside so the other chickens could not get at her when we offered food because being at the bottom of the pecking order meant she was viciously pecked at food times.
A sign of intelligence, as defined as learning how to manipulate the environment for your benefit, was pronounced in Freebie. Perhaps she was an outlier, but in my mind, chickens are capable of quite extraordinary feats if given a good environment, good food, attention, care and myriad enrichment opportunities as are offered by free ranging and love from a young age.
Peter, a dear friend alerted me to your warm, detailed, and comprehensive take on chickens.
I couldn't agree more with your observations. And what a hoot to read the comments!
We are in our first year as chickeners and I have fallen in love with them, way more than I expected.
I think the essence of caring for chickens, as you so well pointed out, is meeting them at a place where you can honestly interact. I had one girl (now deceased) who loved to give chase in our woods. She clearly displayed abilities to shelter herself, to anticipate my moves, and even to survive overnight on her own. We do miss our Ebony. After we buried her, one grandson built a memorial dirtbath.
Thanks for writing this.
sgv
I really don't think it's too fair to call chickens stupid. I consider them to be well designed and with just the right amount of brains necessary for their existence. And look, you can take a chick that hatches from an egg and never has any mother, the chick will (in my backyard) grow up to know what to eat and not eat, when to go to bed, where is a safe place to go to bed, how to take a dirt bath, how to stay safe from hawks, how to compete for food, how to lay more eggs, etc, etc, etc. My backyard hens NEVER had a mother (except me) teach them anything. If you took a day-old human and put it in a cardboard box with plenty of food and water nearby, how long would it last?
Carol - I never called 'em stupid! (they can be a bit daft sometimes, but... who can't?) the comparison with human infants isn't quite fair, though - neoteny means that the trade-off for the eventual pinnacle of the evolution of intelligence, as manifested in your average teenager, is that human infants are spectacularly inept in the early years. Sally, Karen and Rosemary - thanks for your stories - I'd no idea that so many had experience what I had - I thought it was just me had noticed! regards all, peter
Great story, I have had chooks for years and you are spot-on!
On the subject of disabled chooks, I had a pullet about 17 years ago who got a turkey worm infection in her eyes. She ended up blind in the right eye and nearly blind in the left, she could only see out the back half of that eye. She spent months in the shed refusing to come out. One day she suddenly decided to risk it and within a week was mixing with the others. She would grab food and squat over it to keep it from being eaten by someone else.
When my marriage ended I took the chooks back to my parents place and to my surprise this hen hit the ground first, did one lap of their pen and knew her way around from then on. When I moved 12 months later to my new place, I took her with me and she did much the same thing. I expected her to not adapt to a strange place when she'd had so much trouble adapting to being blind in her own home.
She's buried down the back and her descendants (yes, she even produced babies) still dominate my flock, generations down the track.
Marvellous article. All true. In the past my zen moments have happened while sitting in the garden on golden summer evenings surrounded by my hens, my pigs and my dog, all of whom had some important purpose in mind, scratching, rooting or just sniffing the ground, leaving me with nothing to do but think happy thoughts.
May I add a short sentence to para 4?
....not to mention the endearing(?) way women of all ages are called ‘hen’ in parts of Scotland
BwAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAk
Chickens are a few bears short of a carton, but so are many humans I meet daily. I meet humans with a lower iQ than a rock but that dosn't excuse treating them cruely. I don't think brain power should be a measure for how well you are treated in life. I feel pitty for fools but I don't want to hurt them.
I have a small poultry stud and breed several types of pure breeds of chickens and show them all over. I have up to 300 chics plus breeding adults in summer and I spend too much time watching them. But I have to, I have to keep an eye on them thats my job and responsibilty. yes you learn a lot from watching them, it beats going into town and watching people. people are boring and many of them ugly.
Great story! We have three "chickens" but really, they're our pets. They've even been inside our house and been held in our arms. There really is no excuse for treating any chickens inhumanly as far as I can see.
Oh gosh all this chicken love is starting to become claustrophic. Can't any get beyond conformation of your own lives to think about the political analogy made? Or are we just chickens?
We had one old Barred Rock, "Martha", who was such an accomplished escape artist that we gave up returning her to the coop. She spent her nights in the back of the dog house with the dog, and paid her rent with a breakfast treat every morning!
That there are analogies between humans and chooks shouldn't be so surprising - we are, after all, both gregarious creatures who operate best when in small social groups. Chook social structure is much more tightly-knit and defined than human, probably because of this forebrain thing where we do a lot more prediction of the future and planning against non-happening contingencies, but it's very easy to find correlations between behaviour. (same with cat and dog behaviours; many similarities, some significant differences, enough correlations to draw conclusions that can be useful).
One point of similarity is that chooks are individual as humans, within their flock. Some are just plain daft, barely able to see beyond the end of their beak; some are uncaring, some amazingly alert and some uncannily forward-thinking. Making sweeping generalisations about "intelligence" (or "fitness for environment") is no more suitable for chooks than it is for humans.
With pecking order - it changes in chooks. Babies always start out the lowest of the low but as they get older, they shoulder their way into a particular spot. They can move up and down the ladder depending on their circumstances (getting bigger, faster, stronger) or circumstances of others (temporary sickness, broodiness, removal by external factors such as humans or predators).
Or they can be loners, never accepted because of the colour of their feathers or their breed (oh yes, it happens - I have a "colourist" rooster who hates white chooks. I have no idea why. Luckily his son doesn't have the same problems. And Isa Browns are well-known for violently disliking any non-Isa Brown chooks), or just because they don't like company much and prefer to hang on the fringes.
Sometimes a loner finds their place in a completely different flock, and can even become the highest-placed hen. So it can often be a matter of finding one's own little spot in life ... and then defending your spot to the death :). And to do that requires a surprising amount of adaptability and resilience to change, which a truly stupid animal/species just can't do. Heck, most humans don't like it much (neither do cats. Dogs are ok with it).
As an animal behaviourist I can say only one word about your article :
BRILLIANT !
Thank you for it !
And for all the ones that (didn't ) have like this article I suggest you to read "Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn
you should view www.madcitychickens.com
Here in the US we are a bit slow, but now all the rage in the last few years, has been raising backyard chickens. Urban chickening, if you will.
The eggs are sensational, the chickens a marvel to watch, and it gets the neighbors together for some great chats!!
I've been asked: what is it about academics and chickens? - I suggest that they're more similar than we care to admit (speaking on behalf of academics, that is) - really clever on one dimension, daft as a brush on another. . Beady-eyed and ruthless, yet easy prey. Fractious and squabbling, yet ideal for battery farming. Naturally very productive, yet you could always squeeze more out of them. Hard work protecting them from their own stupidity sometimes But if you leave them to be who they are, the product is better, and they are really quite decorative, even amusing. You wouldn't actually want to be one, but you're glad they are there. You can make a fortune out of being a chicken farmer, but you're never, ever going to have a certain something or other that that stupid creature has; doesn't matter how much you kid yourself that your'e "superior"... you just can't have it. Sorry.
Excellent article, it's nice to know that I'm not alone in my appreciation of chicken behaviour. With reference to their diet ("they eat what we eat") you might want to keep your eyes peeled for interefering busybodies because feeding your chickens leftovers and kitchen scraps is illegal, even in a domestice setting (http://www.defra.gov.uk/foodfarm/byproducts/documents/swill-leaflet.pdf). But I won't tell if you don't...
Ah! - thanks for that, Sigurd -though I don't feed them leftovers, of course - I cook them a meal specially, and take a little for myself...
I loved your article! I see somebody suggested you read one of my books, The Pig Who Sang to the Moon. I also wrote one about raising the peaceable kingdom: a dog, cats, two rats, two chickens, and a rabbit. They got on splendidly. Problem was the chickens became so friendly with our dog they thought all dogs were trustworthy, and we were afraid, living as we do on the beach (the chickens would follow us on our walks) that they would come to a bad end, so we gave them to people who lived on a farm with no predators around. They are doing splendidly, years later. That's the thing: I would never eat a chicken (or an egg) because these animals evolved to live for years and years, and when they are "broilers" (horrible word) they get to live just 8 weeks. Even the hens laying eggs have a short and awful life. Free-range can mean just about anything. I hope you don't eat them after seeing what marvelous creatures they are!
Thanks for those tips! - any articles on the web? - you'll perhaps be disappointed to know I did once eat one! - she was killed by a fox, in spite of my best efforts. She was such a game old bird, I felt it was actually honouring her to invite her to a 'last supper'. Actually it was hard work, not only because she was tough as old boots. I do eat the eggs - that's the deal we have - but I don't "retire" them in the usual way; they just become tribal elders or something (and they do seem to 'teach' younger ones)
The joy of backyard hens!
Great article. I have four hens that roam the garden and they are great fun to watch and no bother at all. Easier to keep than a Goldfish! Absolutely fresh, organic eggs every day as well as the happy byproduct of chicken manure (B&Q now sells it!). They act as waste disposal units for any food scraps thus reducing the amount of rubbish to be collected and also clear up the slugs and snails. OK they will have a go at plants and do dig a bit but can be contained in a run or valuable plants protected with wire mesh. And spare eggs can be sold or bartered for other produce ... or just given away to neighbours, family and friends.
If everyhouse with a garden had a few hens in it we wouldn't need battery farms and we would all eat just that little bit better. And with the calming effect of watching busy hens going about their business we would all be just a little bit happier.
I recomend backyard hens absolutely and without hesitation for anyone with a little outside space.
Mmmmmmmm ......... chicken
And did you know that the poo from just three hens produces enough methane to power a steel rolling mill for an entire year! - I've got rolled steel coming out of my ears...
What a fabulous article! Having worked in HR and management consultancy, I decidedly prefer my chickens!
They give me such joy and give the old place a real air of domesticity, when they're wandering about pecking at things, clucking at me, coming to greet me when I come out into the garden.
Their little bodies are miraculous, providing us with sunny eggs for our breakfast and REALLY fast-acting cmpost accelerator! And they are the perfect recycling machines!
Quite hooked now and wanting to grow the flock in a rather small urban garden, hmmmm, maybe not....
lovely article
Did you know it was proven that chickens do math? My life sucks eggs.
As in this reference?:
"Rudiments of mind: Insights through the chick model on number and space cognition in animals"
Giorgio Vallortigara, Lucia Regolin, Cinzia Chiandetti, Rosa Rugani
Mind you, I first saw the story on the BBC website on the 1st april, 2009....
(see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7975260.stm )
Thanks Peter.
Hi Peter,
Great article! Really loved to read about your chickens and loved your view on things. I have a similar relationship with my chickens.
What a wonderful article! Very true, with some excellent and spot on observations. I write about my (currently 13) ex-battery hens and wish I had written this!
I might also add that hens are a great anti-depressant, they lift the soul and bring happiness to the dullest day. When I rehomed my first ex-battery hens I believed I was saving them, in fact it was these 3 special girls who saved me - helping me recover from a nervous breakdown. I am now trying to repay that debt to those girls by campaigning for and rehoming as many ex-batts as they are.
sorry that last sentence should read..'as many ex-batts as possible.'
Caught sight of this article just now. I agree with everything written by you Peter. My girls are funny, intelligent enough to train me, my husband and fatherinlaw to pander to them. I love spending time watching them, even talk to them, and the by product of owning such generous pets are the copious amount of manure for the garden and the mannah of food, the egg.
Long may the partnership continue :)
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