Do Poultry Mourn Over The Loss Of A Flock Mate?

Yes they have emotions, fear, happiness, anger.

WOW!! I do believe animals grieve.My dog turned 2 Dec31 He never knew My Husband or Nephew .My Husband passed in 2013 :My Newphew DIDN't live around here. But every time My "Shadow"gets out of the yard He goes straight to the Cemetery and lays between Their graves and I have to go pick Him up and carry Him home.Seems like this happens close to when I'm feeling depressed.

Thanks for this article, confirming the intelligence and sensitivity of our avian friends....

This mad me cry!

This is a very thoughtful article.
I do believe that chickens mourn the loss of others. These funny, entertaining, little creatures have so many facets to their personalities that peoplevoften don't think about.

I thought chickens were too "birdbrained" for that! I am the one in our family that does all the chores morning and evening. Which includes: Feeding our dog and cats, making sure they have fresh water, gathering eggs, cleaning out nesting boxes, feeding the chickens, feeding the ducks, and making sure they have fresh water. Quite a few months ago, I went on a trip with my cousin. Our dog was prescribed with eye drops at the time and was quite finicky with them. My 12 year old sister was left in charge of doing then chores. Our dog, Benjamin would not eat or let my sister put eye drops in his eye. Then when I came home we went on happily with life!

At our dairy we have a lot of different species that buddy up. Our goat loves our pigs, the cats love my Cocker Spaniel Grace, the baby turkeys love the baby chickens, we had a bunny and a cat that were best friends. The girls (cows) all have special friends but love the cats too.

I loved that article. I had no idea chickens mourn but after reading g this I know doubt believe that that do.

Thank you for the great stories! They are such amazing birds!

Excellent article on a very interesting topic. Something not often covered but a very real thing in flocks.

I'm glad you wrote this I had two light Sussex hens snowy and snow and they stayed together all of the time.

The story.
One night I forgot to shut the door too the hen house and a fox got in and killed snow.
Next morning snowy was fine and was eating with the flock, but then as she looked over totthe other hens and i think she noticed that snow was not their.
So she started to look all over the place for snow to no avail, then she saw the feathers, snows feathers, she just looked at them and then did a surprising thing, she collapsed into the ground and started making a wailing and moaning sound like she was in pain, I went over to her and picked her up she just carried on doing it.
So I took her inside and put her on the kitchen floor and fed her some food.
She stopped after awhile and ate the food I gave her, after she had finished a took her back outside and let her run around with the other girls, she was fine.
But it just shows that Chickens can and do mourn.

Thanks laura.

I was pleased to come across this article. My interest is in chicken behavior and grieving is one of the many areas that more recent research into chicken behavior is investigating.
I have absolutely no doubt that chickens have the capacity to form friendships and mourn the loss of other flock mates. There is so much anecdotal evidence from peoples observations that even if you allow for misinterpreting and anthropomorphism at their extremes there is more to chickens emotional capacity than the human species is ready to admit.
You may have read this (?)
https://digitalcommons.calpoly.edu/...kgo.com&httpsredir=1&article=2005&context=bts