Birds of a feather... on the road and in the yard

When I was told thatmy recent article on Palmerston North’s ring road ruffled a few feathers and put a few car-centric locals into a flap, I thought of chickens.

Not whether they’d cross the ring road, but why we have chicken-related idioms and phrases in our vernacular.

One summer long ago, as a 12 year old, I caught awild rooster and took him home. Assuming he was lonely, I borrowed a couple of hens from a friend of mine and then proceeded to grow my own flock.

My teenage years were spent, among sport and school, tending the chickens in the morning and then again in the afternoon. I was proud to be able to take a handful of fresh eggs to the kitchen for cooking and baking.

Many an hour was spent watching them and understanding how they went about their business, how they behaved.

Chickens are social animals. They prefer to hang around in groups, and they get lonely on their own. They have a hierarchy. If you have a rooster he’s the top dog, the chairman of the board. He literally rules the roost at night, and during the day he spends his time keeping his flock safe by rounding them up now and again so that he knowswhere they all are. His other main jobs are to ensure his hen’s eggs are fertilised, and that his humans get up at the crack of dawn.

If there’s another rooster the two of them will fight. Viciously. Roosters are almost comical to watch strutting their stuff, but they take their important position seriously.

Hens really do have a pecking order, and if there is no rooster, it’s pretty nasty.

Through intimidation and some argybargy, the order is set, and you don’t want to be on the bottom.

Down there you have to wait to eat after the others have finished, and you are always on your toes trying to avoid getting verbally and physically assaulted.

At the bottom of the pecking order, you don’t share the lofty heights of the upper perch, so you can literally get shat upon.

One lowly-ranked hen we had found an outlet by picking on the cat. The cat probably responded by kicking the dog. Chooks love roaming around the yard and when they can do that, boredom is released and the social pressures dissipate. Anyway, it’s easier to run away from the bullywhen you’re not locked down in the chicken run.

Outside they are constantly scratching around to find healthy food; grubs, worms, green leaves, carefully tended vegetables, and cat food. Cats are no match for a hungry chicken. There’s a reason why the chooks aren’t let out in a Japanese garden, but then again backyards with chooks don’t have a snail problem.

If one hen is given something big and yummy then it will run away with it in its beak, the others chasing until the lucky one drops hermeal or the pursuers become distracted. If they think one of their peers is onto something good, like a newly planted patch of garden, they’ll jump on the bandwagon. And trendy places where they can scratch around or dust-bath can be popular all summer until one day it’s suddenly forgotten.

When hens are stressed they stop being productive.

If they get frightened or you move them to an unfamiliar place theywill stop laying for a few days until they can become accustomed to their new environment.

The worst is when you put a new hen in with the incumbents. There will be merciless

Send brief messages to TXT 021 064 0009 agitation and bullying until a new pecking order is established and relative calm then descends.

If you don’t collect the eggs for a few days, one will get clucky and stay on the nest. Threeweeks later, if the rooster is competent, some fluffy chickswill emerge. Mother hens spend their days keeping the chicks under theirwings, and ‘‘helicoptering’’ their brood.

Other hens won’t mess with amother hen because they will fiercely protect their chicks, and will occasionally give a rooster the hurry up. It all sounds rather familiar doesn’t it? Humans are more like chickens than we’d like to admit. They are a parody of us and so are part of our language.

For example, when some dumb cluck ruffles my feathers by feeding me some cock and bull story I try not to brood over it.

Instead, I’ll hatch a plan to write something which will put egg on the face of that bird brain. Being no spring chicken, I’m disinclined towalk on eggshells to get my point across, but then getting it past the editor can be like sneaking the sunrise past the rooster.