Book "Feathers"

[TinaG]

Just wanted to pass along a recommendation for an excellent natural history book called "Feathers: The Evolution of a Natural Miracle" by Thor Hanson. It's an easy read and while it deals with the adaptive use of feathers by all birds, it does have some chicken references (and to the author's credit, he and his family have a backyard chicken flock which he references several times.

 

[PeanutnCashew]

sounds interesting!! Thanks!

 

[TinaG]

I'm almost finished with this book and just wanted to say there is so much in here that explains basic chicken behavior and physiology that it's definitely worth reading. My undergrad degrees had an emphasis on ornithology and I'm an obsessive birding geek, but if my textbooks had been this enjoyable to read I might have done something with the degrees. I wanted to share one particular chicken-related excerpt:

"Before Eliza and I had a child, we had chickens. And to a certain degree, acquiring them resembled the process of bringing a baby into the world. First came a long gestation period of planning, reading, discussing, fencing and multiple trips to the website "Findmychicken.com".

"When we first got them home, the birds spent much of their time dashing madly about the orchard, flapping their stubby wings and even lifting themselves into the air for short, low flights. All three wer Silver-laced Wyandottes, a beautiful breed whose plumage is elegantly lined with black. In flight, however, not even the pretty feathers could give their stout bodies a semblance of grace. They hurtled awkwardly forward like overfed wind-up toys, necks jutting out and wings beating frantically to gain a few brief inches of altitude. Wile E. Coyote had a similar look in the old Roadrunner cartoons right after he ran off a cliff - his pumping legs kept him airborne for a few seconds but gravity always won in the end. Watching this spectacle from the porch..., I realized that our chickens might be acting out a scene from their own evolution. A running, flapping chicken gets right at the heart of one of ornithology's most divisive questions: ground-up or tree-down?"

(the author is referring to the ideas about the origins of bird flight - from ground-running Therapod dinosaurs that kept launching themselves into the air until they figured out it had an evolutionary advantage or tree-down - tree-dwelling gliders that developed powered, controlled flight to escape from predators or get to a better tree. There is a 3rd newer hypothesis that combines the best of both theories, but you'll have to read the book to find out! Let's just say it involves a study of Chukar Partridges and practical cowboy insight)