Sweaters for Chickens

Apparently a club of knitters in Somerset, England, has taken to knitting sweaters for chickens who have just ended their careers as industrial egg layers.

This concept makes me really happy. These "battery hens" are usually sold for slaughter after their first year of service (since after a year they start laying fewer eggs). A "rescue center" in Great Britain has taken to buying these year old chickens and finding homes for them. Unfortunately many of these birds lose their feathers during their egg-laying careers and therefore don't have the fluff to keep themselves warm. Hence the sweaters.

There are a lot of reasons why this makes me happy. One is simply the footage of British people sitting around and knitting jumpers for hens. That's just awesome.

Part of my pleasure is that this is another culture (however similar our languages may be), so I can just be amused and pleased without it being an enormous political statement.

I love that these people want to give a few chickens a happy and cozy retirement. It's a bit of goofy kindness towards some fairly unintelligent animals. A bit of kindness that gives a few people some time to enjoy a hobby together, some animal lovers a chance to help a few creatures who've had a pretty hard knock life.

It's not going to change the world, but it is really lovely. Just a happy small moment of "really? sweaters for chickens?"

Sometimes it's good to take a break from worrying about identity and how the heck I'm going to pay for grad school and just visualize a hen's first run around a yard in her new sweater. What chicken joy these people have created. How excited that bird might be to eat a bug and scratch at the dirt and run in circles and generally act like a chicken. It's an amusing mental image- try it!

Here is the full BBC article (with short video clip), if you're interested, and here is a link to the Little Hen Rescue website.