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Home » Which comes first, the duck or the chicken?

Which comes first, the duck or the chicken?

The New Neo Posted on by

On the “literally” thread, commenter expat asked a burning question:

Maybe you can help me figure out whether the duck who lives with my cousin’s chickens is literally transspecies. His egg was abandoned by his mother in the creek that is literally 10 feet from the chicken yard. He was hatched by one of the chickens and decided to remain with them despite the fact that he could easily escape back into the creek where his relatives swim by regularly. I haven’t checked for position papers from the LGBT community on transpecieism, so I don’t know where I stand on whether he is literally a chicken.

I long for a simpler life when you could look in a dictionary to find such answers.

Well, I don’t shy from the tough questions, but that one’s really tough. Who can fathom the mind of a chicken?

Expat’s cousin’s duck, of course, has been imprinted, although that doesn’t answer the question. It’s possible that the duck doesn’t feel that it’s a chicken, it feels that the chickens are actually ducks.

Which brings us to the wonderful YouTube, which has video on practically everything. On a hunch, I searched for something about Konrad Lorenz and imprinting. Sure enough, bingo!

And as far as whether we might be able to understand what chickens might think, let’s hear from Neruda (I assume a similar sentiment could be expressed about ducks):

…I’m tired of the harsh sea
and the mysterious earth.
I’m tired of chickens–
we never know what they think,
and they look at us with dry eyes
as though we were unimportant…

Once more, with feeling, in Spanish:

…Estoy cansado del mar duro
y de la tierra misteriosa.
Estoy cansado de las gallinas:
nunca supimos lo que piensan,
y nos miran con ojos secos
sin concedernos importancia…

[ADDENDUM: Then there’s the Churkendoose of my youth. Until I looked it up just now I thought the recording was made by Danny Kaye. Turns out it was Ray Bolger.]

Comments

Which comes first, the duck or the chicken? — 26 Comments

  3. the LGBTQ would say the duck was a chicken because they believed they were a chicken inside… duh… how can that be any different than a man in a dress telling everyone he is a 6 year old girl and gets to use the womens room… even with free tampons now in the mens room…

    Maybe a campaign promise that a duck is a duck and a chicken is a chicken and both seem to be quite fowl

    TRUMP’S BEST CAMPAIGN AD EVER Just Came From Barack Obama…ENJOY! [VIDEO]
    http://endingthefed.com/trumps-best-campaign-ad-ever-just-came-from-barack-obama-enjoy-video.html

  5. Merle obviously has been imprinted to think he is a chicken. Still that doesn’t make him one. I haven’t noticed any competition with the rooster for strong-man status. It appears that he is transsexual as well as transspecies. (I’m assuming that ducks are similar to geese in this.)

  9. As a farm boy I can affirm that hatchlings fixate on the first thing they see. Chickens, ducks, and geese are all the same. As a kid I was in charge of caring for the peeps, so I was the first thing they saw. They would follow me everywhere around the farm yard. It remained true when they were mature. Our current flock of 6 hens think I am momma.

  10. Paul in Boston:

    Pretty funny.

    But you could also say the “shark” is imprinted on the duck. Or perhaps the Roomba is imprinted on the duck.

    I’m surprised the PETA folks haven’t come to get the maker of the video.

  12. I wonder how long it takes for mothers to imprint themselves on human kids. Somehow I don’t think a few months is enough, and certainly the process can’t be carried out well by a succession of of nannies, childcare workers, and kindergarten teachers. That may be why we have some many confused kids these days.

  13. expat,

    From my experience, our children and grandchildren via the nipple, lock onto momma instantly. It takes a few months before they recognize dad or granddad as supporting characters.

  14. parker,
    that makes sense, but what happens if mom becomes a heroin addict and stops caring for the kid? How do kids cope with a broken relationship, especially if there is no one else to pick up the pieces. I think kids need a solid foundation. Too many today lack that.

    This has been on my mind since I’ve been visiting home and seeing and hearing about some amazing dysfunction. Then again, you get stories like An Invisible Thread, in which a kid whom most would have written off is saved by a stranger who starts a relationship by taking him to McDonalds. This is the kind of story that makes me such a bottom-up person.

  15. I had this happen this summer. A chicken egg was laid in a Duck’s Nest. The mom and dad took care of it little chicken and her own ducklings and all was well. All the little babies grow up and then everything fell apart. Grown ducklings and adult ducks started attacking the little chicken. My flock of chickens started attacking a little chicken. That little hen kept to herself, stayed by herself, and was picked off by a fox. Sad but true, she just didn’t fit in with either flock. Just might be some sort of a lesson there.

  16. Only one way to be 100% sure. Chickens are generally much drier, the fat int he duck gives much juicier taste. I suggest sauteing in a pan.

  18. Based on what experience with ducks is the commentor asserting “literally abandoned by his mother” (sic., mother?), and “in the creek”? I raise ducks, when they are laying, eggs are usually in the nests, but I have found eggs out in the open, at the base of trees, in the mud. When the ducks are brooding, yes, they lay on the nests and one will not see a better imitation of a feathered dinosaur than a female duck sitting on eggs. (Males are drakes; neither are ‘mothers’ or ‘fathers’. Spare me that silliness.) How did that chicken pick up the egg from the water? His relatives, swimming in the creek? From Rawhide: “Don’t try to understand ’em, just rope and ride and brand ’em!”
    By the way, duck eggs are very delicious; no sulphur odor from them hard boiled, bright yellow-orange in the omelet. We have 16 ducks.

  19. Kerry,
    I don’t know duck-raiser terminology. There was a duck egg, no other ducks were around; a human picked it up and put it under a chicken.

  20. On another note, Richard Cohen has decided that Trump is much more like hitler because he didnt believe obama was born in the US… funny, but when is being gullible to the point of stupid a pre-requisite of serving as president… it would not be the first time the nation was banmboozeled wiht a lie, or a half lie or a quarter lie for personal gain that confounded the truth and made any answer questionable?

    on another note, there is a lovely article that basically says people should not own more than one gun and that politicians can ignore them as the real gun owners are a minority group of owners wiht more than one. of course the article ignores there is a constitution, and so its calling for the left to ignore the law of the land, then there is the fact that the US protects minority rights whether its gun owners in small numbers or blacks… the point being that the masses dont have a right to trample on people because of their numbers.

    its getting so much like soviet living where the authors of the papers and articles are quietly calling for a totalitarian seizure of power without actually calling for a seizure of power by dressing it up as the will of the people. you know, like the chinse communist party is doing the will fo the people

    we are in deep deep deep dooooo dooo

    and the not left is about as usful and important as a fart in a pickle barrel.

  21. and if you wondering here, how is a duck like a chicken. well how is a capitalist patriot (not nationalist as patrotism and nationalism are distant cousins), constituationalist who fought for jews and blacks, and so on… is like hitler because of a lying president who NO ONE knows the truth about because the records are sealed that they want others to have open

    In his brazen lies, Donald’s like Adolf
    http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/richard-cohen-brazen-lies-donald-adolf-article-1.2798680

    A newly married couple went for a walk together in a wood, one fine summer’s evening after dinner. They were having such a wonderful time being together until they heard a sound in the distance:

    “Quack! Quack!”

    “Listen,” said the wife, “That must be a chicken.”
    “No, no. That was a duck,” said the husband.

    “No, I’m sure that was a chicken,” she said.
    “Impossible. Chickens go ‘Cock-a-doodle-doo,’ ducks go ‘Quack! Quack!’ That’s a duck, darling,” he said, with the first signs of irritation.

    “Quack! Quack!” it went again.
    “See! It’s a duck,” he said.
    “No dear. That’s a chicken. I’m positive,” she asserted, digging in her heels.

    “Listen wife! That–is–a–duck. D-u-c-k, duck! Got it?” he said angrily.
    “But it’s a chicken,” she protested.
    “It’s a friggin’ duck, you, you…”

    And it went “Quack! Quack!” again before he said something he oughtn’t.
    The wife was almost in tears. “But it’s a chicken.”

    The husband saw the tears welling up in his wife’s eyes and, at last, remembered why he had married her. His face softened and he said gently, “Sorry, darling. I think you must be right. That is a chicken.”
    “Thank you, darling,” she said and she squeezed his hand.

    “Quack! Quack!” came the sound through the woods, as they continued their walk together in love.

  23. I had some runner ducks once, which are a bit too hyper to set their eggs. I put three under a broody hen who hatched and raised them well, although she was rather perturbed when they first jumped into one of the kiddy pools I had for the ducks. They seemed to acknowledge her as their mother hen, but had no perceptible identity crisis from being “adopted.” Adopted, they adapted.

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