People know that chickens are tasty yet, a myth persists that they are dumb animals lacking emotions. The prevailing attitude is that they’re merely industrial grade food producers. They are not chicken companions. Well, maybe that is not true.
We’ve kept small flocks of chickens for years and learn from every grouop. They’ve taught us how similar they are to humans in some ways. They are adaptable and can be good parents regardless of the offspring lineage. An example happened this year.
Broody
The California White patiently sitting.
We have one California White. She is a commercial hybrid chicken developed for the egg industry. Small, skinny and nervous California Whites are prolific layers, not inclined to go broody. Broodiness is a bird trait that simply means that a hen wants to be a mother.
A broody hen lays a clutch of a dozen, or so, eggs, fluffs up her feathers, changes her clucks, and settles down for a three-week incubation. After that stint of sitting, eggs miraculously hatch. Mom cares for chicks as they grow, protecting them from the cold while teaching them how to find food and water, and avoid danger.
Egg Producer Needs
Egg producers don’t want chicken motherhood. Commercial egg producers dislike chicken motherhood because a broody hen pauses egg laying for a couple of months. That costs money. Breeders have supposedly eliminated the broodiness from California White genes.
Persistent Broodiness
Not ours. In November and again in March our California White decided “yes to motherhood”. She fluffed her feathers, and began sitting on eggs laid by her flock mates. The first time, in the fall, we kept removing her and taking the eggs in an effort to discourage her broodiness. She temporarily stopped being broody. Then, in the spring, she started being broody again and was more persistent than we are. She just kept sitting and sitting.
Finally, we said OK and let her incubate five eggs. After three weeks a brown egg hatched. We knew the chick wasn’t our California White’s biological mother, as she lays white eggs.
Good Parenting is Good Parenting
Ancestry didn’t matter. Our hen was an attentive mother. On cold nights her baby nestled into her warm downy feathers and during the day scampered about under Mom’s watchful eye. We didn’t know if the chick was her son or daughter but as it matured it became an obvious female that’s now five months old.
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- Parenting
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- Keeping the chick warm
Companionship
Bonded
Enter companionship. Every night our California White sleeps next to her now adult daughter. Is it affection? Simple familiarity? Chicken Companionship? We don’t know, but the pair seems to look out for each other and enjoy each other’s company.
We see other signs of chicken companionship and caring. Our dozen birds seem to make friends and two or three will often hang around together during the day and sleep side by side on the roost at night. When a hen is not feeling well often another will sit with her during recovery.
All are signs of bonding. We don’t know what they’re thinking or feeling, but our chickens demonstrate that they’re more than just food producing machines.
Wealth of Information
Want to learn more about backyard chickens? Check out the Hoover’s Hatchery website at hoovershatchery.com. It’s loaded with information.
