"Regarding"

[azurelunatic]

I grew up with chickens. One of the things you learn fast is the way a chicken looks at something when it's about to peck it, fly on it, or fly over it. There's a particular trick to the way they move their heads -- not just looking at it with one eye, but pointing their beak directly at it and focusing both eyes.

You learn this expression very fast, especially if you wanted to keep eating that sandwich.

We called this "regarding", overloading the word's meaning beyond the mere "to look at attentively; observe closely". If a chicken was looking at something with that intensity, it meant something, and we knew what it meant.

Check out the image here. Not the drinking hen, the one with her face in the camera.

If you ever see a chicken looking at you like that, make sure it's not within beak-range of anything important, such as your eyes. Guard your lunch well.

Comments

[eternal-vows.livejournal.com]

Amazing advice. But I do not think I will be encountering chickens. I will keep it in mind though.

[azurelunatic]

If you ever meet one, I am sure you will remember it.

[smmc.livejournal.com]

Hehehehe. Yes, I remember that look very well. Though we only ever had one house chicken, she would do that look when she was about to peck you to demand to be allowed outside for the day.

[azurelunatic]

And if someone is grouchy and wanting to peck someone, there's that smoothing-down of the upper hackle while the lower hackle puffs out.

[trixieleitz]

Oh, yes, that's a familiar look....

[azurelunatic]

I feel sure that the next moment was a pecked lens.

[onyxrising.livejournal.com]

I want a raptor chicken. Did I ever tell you about the raptor chickens?

[azurelunatic]

I'm not sure!

[onyxrising.livejournal.com]

U of Montana discovered that chickens still had a great deal of the DNA in them from when their ancestors were raptors. They just weren't using it. U of Montana decided to solve the not using it part.
The result was chickens with teeth and raptor tails. We want one.
Sadly, I didn't save the article link. I've been having trouble finding it again, because all of the keywords are quite common to other things as well.

[azurelunatic]

http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/14/should-we-build-a-dinosaur/?apage=3 and http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1026340/Jurassic-Park-comes-true-How-scientists-bringing-dinosaurs-life-help-humble-chicken.html both seem to be good sources for further digging. I seem to recall bits of that as well.

Given how pecky chickens generally are, and my well-known boycott of any animated feature involving chickens with teeth, I think I'll stay with the modern chicken.

[onyxrising.livejournal.com]

I'm curious what arming the chicken does to their temperments. I mean, you know how sweet bantam hens are. Do they cease to be cuddly and pet-able once they realize that you, too, can be dinner?

[azurelunatic]

I have known my fair share of fucking bitey bantam hens. Wouldn't want that with teeth.

[onyxrising.livejournal.com]

Maybe it was the breeding at our place- all of the batams we had were descended from one, very sweet, hen, and had been bred with fairly even tempered roosters. Ours weren't so big on the pecking of hands.

[onyxrising.livejournal.com]

And I'd want them. I could totally see a very profitable specialty meat market for those tails.