Where is a chickens brain

Chickens do have brains, yes. Hence, why a chicken can run around with its head cut off, and even survive for a short time. But usually for no more than a few minutes. There is one legendary story, however. A chicken called Mike was able to live for around 18 months without his head. It was back in , and farmer Lloyd Olsen was butchering some of his chickens. I think he didn't ever want to admit he screwed up and let the proverbial goose that lays golden eggs die on him.

Olsen would never tell what he did with the dead bird. But by any measure Mike, bred as a fryer chicken, had a good innings. How had he been able to survive for so long? The thing that surprises Dr Tom Smulders, a chicken expert at the Centre for Behaviour and Evolution at Newcastle University, is that he did not bleed to death.

The fact that he was able to continue functioning without a head he finds easier to explain. For a human to lose his or her head would involve an almost total loss of the brain.

For a chicken, it's rather different. It is mostly concentrated at the back of the skull, behind the eyes, he explains. Reports indicate that Mike's beak, face, eyes and an ear were removed with the hatchet blow. It was suggested at the time that Mike survived the blow because part or all of the brain stem remained attached to his body. Since then science has evolved, and what was then called the brain stem has been found to be part of the brain proper.

Why those who tried to create a Mike of their own did not succeed is hard to explain. When a gust of wind ruffles the feathers of their chicks, mother hens begin to develop the same symptoms of stress as their startled offspring.

It appears, then, that chickens are capable of empathy - being able to understand the predicaments that other members of their species might find themselves in. It's a level of understanding that's only been seen in relatively few animals, such as primates and ravens. The group "Farm Sanctuary" hopes to raise awareness of the conditions that many animals are raised in. Researchers have also been perplexed by the capacity of chickens for subterfuge and deceit.

Lower-ranking males, for instance might try to lure a female with foraged food in the normal way, but at the same time they will forego the courtship calls that normally accompany the behavior. That way, they can help make sure the alpha male doesn't get to find out about the "romantic" rendezvous.

The common chicken Gallus gallus domesticus stems from the red jungle fowl, a game bird from southeast Asia. There are more of them than any other domesticated animal in the world, with some 20 billion living in our midst - about three per person. About twice that number are slaughtered each year.

Most of the birds that we eat are reared intensively on battery farms. Many of them see no sunlight over the course of their short lives. They are not able to develop properly, being crammed into tight cages and many suffer injuries mutually inflicted on one another in the stressful environment. Japanese authorities have started culling thousands of chickens and ducks after detecting a highly contagious strain of bird flu.

The disease had already hit several European countries, including Germany. A German court has ruled that the mass slaughter of male chicks does not violate animal protection laws. In , a Mrs. Olson, wife of farmer Lloyd Olsen, says Time , chopped the head off a chicken. The blow was aimed with the intent of keeping as much of the neck intact as possible, says Bec Crew for Scientific American.

The neck meat was to be a treat for a visiting mother. Olsen whiffed her blow and separated some, but not all, of the chicken's brain from its body. Chicken's brains are arranged at such an angle that the most basic parts of the brain, the cerebellum and the brain stem, can remain nestled in the neck even if most of the head is gone, says Rebecca Katzman for Modern Farmer.