Chickens really do remind me of people - and not just people, but specially human bullies.
The thing is, there basically aren’t any really herbivorous mammals, whatever people say. Sheep, cattle, deer, rabbits, etc. have all been observed killing and eating other vertebrates.
Chickens are recognized as omnivores, though most people don’t realize how effective they are as hunters. I used to have a compost bin next to the chicken house, and mice would nest in it. When the compost got disturbed, the mice would come running out - any that made the mistake of running into the chicken pen were goners. The chickens would casually snatch them off the ground, break their necks and tear them apart. They almost make cats look like amateur predators in comparison.
I have personally observed a horse chasing dogs away from a steak in order to eat it himself. He also loved raw eggs. Another preferred ham and cheese, especially with a pickle.
A common feature in horse paddocks and cattle pens is the salt block. It’s meant to replace nutrients not found in most domestic feed. Nutrients quite possiblity obtained in the wild by the occasional snacking on small creatures that hide in the grass. But because it looks like the animal is just grabbing a mouthful of grass, no one realises what’s going on.
Sharp canine teeth are only needed for tearing mouthfuls meat from a larger animal, not consuming a relatively small one whole.
People think of chickens as food, or huddling helplessly in cages, not as slightly-small, de-fanged, de-clawed velociraptors. (Real velociraptors being the size of turkeys.) Left to forage, they’re going to be eating invertebrates, amphibians and reptiles.
Ah yeah, I forgot horses. I think I read an article not too long ago about horses being observed stomping on small mammals to kill and eat them. I’ve read about people talking about how their horses had a taste for roadkill and apparently in places like Bhutan the royal horses are fed a regular diet that includes beef/yak meat. And like cattle, they’ve been known to eat people (who were already dead, but both horses and cattle also kill people, so…), which they managed to achieve even without possessing canine teeth.
Yeah, I think the habit of eating ground animals often hidden from observers in grass (birds, rabbits, kittens…) has meant people tended not to notice just how much meat horses, cattle, sheep etc. were actually eating.
That ruminants do this makes me wonder how their different kind of digestive system handles this, as I thought I’d read somewhere that switching up foods abruptly can be hard on the old rumen.
But where there’s a protein/nutrient source there’s a way, apparently…
Oh, and I would not put much past chickens, just look into that eye. Like a doll’s eye…
This brings to mind one of my favorite children’s picture books The Big Bad Fox by Benjamin Renner.
The local chickens aren’t intimidated by the fox and if he picks a fight with them he always loses. His mentor the Wolf tells him to raise his own chickens but when the eggs hatch the chicks imprint on the fox and call him mommy…
i’ve seen chickens scarfing down the little anole lizards like popcorn.
i’ve seen them eat mice and garder snakes, poor snakes don’t stand a chance.
I love owls, and they are everywhere in popular culture imagery right now, but very few things alive are as vicious of killing machines as some owls. the only reason owls are cute is we aren’t small enough to be eviscerated and consumed half alive.
