Intelligence

Yesterday morning, Rizzo the chicken managed to evade me. She didn't want to go back into the chicken house after the morning scratch, so she squeezed her deceptively skinny body out of the run. After I'd tried to encourage her back, she used the compost bin and then the potting shelf to get onto the top on the chicken house. I couldn't get her up there.


After the roof, she moved into a tree.

This all took about three minutes. A bird that can't fly and is notoriously dumb figured out if she got up high, the predator (that's me) couldn't reach her.

I came home after dark and couldn't find her. I feared she may have fluttered down into the garden behind us. There be two big dogs there that wouldn't have taken kindly to her intrusion. She may have wandered a little further into the garden of the family I have no doubt would have had her on a spit by lunchtime (I know this from conversations and experience).

Turns out she was next door, she's safe there because the three lazy brothers live there. I'll go and get her when she roosts later.

It maybe nature that send her high and hide when she perceives danger, but I think it's pretty smart she figured out how to get high so quickly while running around clucking. Most animals will avoid danger rather than run headlong into it.


So why is it that humans, supposedly the smartest creatures on earth can't figure out that avoiding agro is better than starting it? That violence begets violence and posters and banners spewing hate messages only affirms what some were already thinking, which in turn leads to more violence.

Live in peace, spread no messages of hate and remember when you're out on your own, you're much more vulnerable and more easily picked off, which no one really wants...

...unless they fancy chicken for dinner.