A Little Bit of Chicken Love
I have been asked if chickens feel. Emotions. Thoughts. Sometimes I am told whether they do or not (and when I *am* being told, it’s to let me know they don’t). I am unsure of the nuances and depth of chicken thought and feelings. I know they experience emotions, I have seen it. This is irrefutable to me. It is simple fact made complex by people.
Today I watched two animals bond. It was a simple act of comfort being offered and accepted. I cannot describe it in any other way.
There is a hen who has a bad eye. The eye, it squints. There is perhaps difficulty seeing. When she cannot see, she becomes uncomfortable in her skin. You can see it by the way she turns in circles, keeping her good eye to the world. When the good eye is turned the wrong way, towards the center of the circle, her world winnows down and she paces, circles, paces, circles. You want to reach out and help her but know quickly how flighty she is, how afraid of humans a hen from a battery cage operation becomes.
Her good eye suddenly catches sight of white, feather, fluff. The soft down of another bird. Carefully, she investigates. Sometimes those she seeks to touch retaliate with pecks or move away. Sometimes chickens are moody and cruel. She stands in front of the other bird, then sidles to the side – I am no threat, she says, remember me? The other bird appears to do so. She is an ex-battery cage hen too.
Under the misters, they touch. Squinty-eyed hen circles the seeing hen, leaning into her, deeply, superficially, but always touching. She drapes a head over her companion’s back. She touches the comb of her friend, gently. At one point, she falls deeply into the contours of the hen’s body, filling the small “s”. A perfect connection.
But this photo is my favorite moment. It is the second the hen with the squinty eye can totally relax it. She does not struggle to keep her bad eye open. She closes it. She has a friend.
A little note: The hen on the right is supposed to be white. It is hot today, the misters were on, and she kept cool by dust-bathing in red clay earth.
I see that Stephanie the Blogger “likes” this post (hey, come back, Blogger friend, we miss you muchly!).
And I see that Olivia the Outlayer (that’s me) also “likes” this post (though I don’t have an official WordPress account, which is why I “like” it in words rather than in a click-able photo.
Marji, the leaner and the leaned into a precious. A friend in need and a friend in deed. Two (chick)peas in a pod.
Here’s a sweet vignette of two chickens who are as intimately bonded as any mother and child you’ve ever seen: http://www.humanemyth.org/mediabase/1067.htm
I think all of us are designed to be like mother hens, freely bestowing our unselfish affection on all the world’s little ones who need our guidance and protection. And I think all of us are designed to be like little chicks, gratefully accepting offers of care and safety from those who love us.
Oops, I meant to write: “Marji, the leaner and the leaned into ARE precious.”
Oops again: I also meant to put a closed parenthesis after the word “photo” in the sentence above that one.
I guess my name should be Oops-Oops-Olivia, aka Triple O. Or would that be quintuple O? :-)
Eloquent and perceptive, thank you.
You’ve done justice by these lovely creatures! The red clay suits them well. Absolutely beautiful!
This is wonderful and moving. It ‘s so obvious that sentient beings are, you know, sentient. I grow weary of people tying themselves in verbal knots trying to assert that love isn’t love or that pain isn’t pain to any non human animal. Thanks for this lovely moment.
Beautiful. Thank you.
What a truly fun blog..
I have 2 chickens . One of them doesn’t lay eggs but i keep the little bugger anyway for entertainment as i watch it run round my yard ( I think it may have a sprinkling of the Corkeys). One of them seems quite clever , yet the other is as dumb as a box of rocks. A bit like people really.
May I ask, good sir, why you choose to call these chickens “it” when you know their gender? Why not use the pronoun “she” to describe them, as you would if you were talking about humans you know to be females?
And if the one stops running around, stops “entertaining” you, as she stopped laying eggs (or perhaps never did), will you decide she is worthless? No longer worth keeping?
Are you sure one hen “is as dumb as a box of rocks”? Could that just be an unenlightened perception of her? What if you were to put aside those thoughts and be still and quietly watch for every good and lovely and intelligent quality she possesses? You just might be surprised at what you find!
Our Creator doesn’t make “dumb.” Or “blind.” We needn’t let ourselves by imposed upon by those false beliefs about creatures — humans and nonhumans alike. Scratch the surface, as a hen scratches the dirt, and we find a profusion of beautiful talents, abilities, expressions of Life, of Mind, of Love.
Happy days of discovery to you!
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