Exploding Eggs Kill Hens
"The sky is falling!" That's what Chicken Little said and then panicked after an acorn dropped on his head. Even though he comes from a fable, it appears chickens might be terrified of things in the sky.
In London, the Telegraph reported claims from a farmer that the presence of hot air balloons were causing her chickens to go into hysteria. But, in their attempt to hide, the birds bump into enough other frightened poultry, or walls, causing their unlaid eggs to explode inside their bodies, killing them.
This bit of news is surprising and sad. But fortunately, the ballooning company has agreed to steer clear of the hen's fields now.
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9 Comments:
I'm having a little trouble buying this.It seems odd that a bird could run into something with such force that it would cause the eggs to explode.
dbcurrie at 7:17PM on 11/08/08
I smell crazy. Unless the eggs are somehow pressurized they couldn't possibly "explode". Break maybe, but even that seems unlikely.
martij at 8:10PM on 11/08/08
If chicken's eggs explode inside of them with the mere-est of chicken-y bumps; chickens are greater evolutionary fail than pandas....
feriorrenna at 8:23PM on 11/08/08
Oooh! I smell a new Mythbusters experiment.
buffy at 8:30PM on 11/08/08
Horses are pretty stupid (don't go yelling at me - YES THEY ARE), and they do panic from the noise of a hot air balloon, but chickens? I know they can get stressed, but one actually lived for 18 months with the head cut off. Personally, I think they're too stupid to be that afraid of noise, and those eggs are well-designed and protected.
PerkyMac at 9:29PM on 11/08/08
It does seem rather odd. Taken from the article: "Miss Vincent-Lloyd, 32, said post mortems of the animals revealed they had died from peritonitis, developed from the egg being released inside them." And,"I told the vet about the hot-air balloons and jets flying low over the farm and straight away he said that was the cause."
While her vet may say the balloons can cause this, there may be another explanation. Egg peritonitis, what the dead birds were diagnosed with, can be caused by E. coli infection or acute fowl cholera. Once the balloons stop flying over the farmer's field, if the chickens keep dying then one of these problems could be the culprit.
Linnea Covington at 10:02PM on 11/08/08
when an egg is first laid i thought the shell was pretty maleable so as to pass through the chicken, i'd think it would have to hit something pretty hard to break the egg. Sounds like this farmer is looking for renumeration of some kind.
huneybumper at 4:24PM on 11/09/08
@ buffy--Mythbusters it is!
dhorst at 5:17PM on 11/09/08
If you have ever watched a chicken lay an egg you know that the outer "shell" is NOT Hard & Rigid like the eggs you buy in the grocery store. To make it possible for the chicken to pass the egg it remains soft and malleable until it is exposed to the air.
Chickens would be VERY frightened of a hot air balloon, they would consider it a predator that wants to swoop down and eat them like a chicken hawk or other bird of prey.
Eggs did not "explode" in these chickens, but they probably were very stressed by the giant "hot air balloon predators", and the extra stress added to thier demise.
HelloChris at 10:00AM on 11/10/08