A Day at the Chicken Spa

There comes a day in every chicken's life when he or she must go to the chicken spa to get a pedicure or beak trim. Last week, my chickens took a trip to the spa, and we made a video to show you how to do it yourself.

When trimming a chicken's toenail, its important to note that you don't want to trim much off. You want to avoid hitting the quick, which is where the blood flow is in the nail, as shown in this illustration from http://www.lafebervet.com/. You can cut anywhere to the left of the imaginary yellow line.

Trimming beaks can be done if you notice that it is affecting the way that a chicken eats, or if you notice that a chicken is losing weight. After trimming a beak, you can smooth out the sides with a nail file. Just be sure to give you chicken lots of breaks to keep them from getting stressed.

Hope these tips help with your beak or nail trimming endeavors. If you have any questions, please comment below!

Fowl Science

Chickens are "in" right now. It is popular to have backyard chickens, who live in a cute coop that was purchased at a local feed store, and lay eggs for your family every day. Some people go a step further and breed their birds, or even show them at poultry shows. But it seems as though chickens have come to the forefront of modern science lately, as they have been found to have some interesting characteristics that may change what scientists previously thought was possible.

This article from LiveScience.com, which was released at the beginning of the month, talks about a new state of matter that was recently discovered inside the eye of a chicken. 

http://www.livescience.com/43623-state-of-matter-found-chicken-eye.html

Additionally, this article from FoxNews.com discusses the ability of the chicken's ear to repair itself, and that, by studying this, scientists may be able to research new ways to cure hearing loss in humans.
http://www.foxnews.com/health/2014/03/12/do-chickens-hold-key-to-cure-for-hearing-loss/?intcmp=features

Chickens are entertaining, personable, unique, friendly little creatures, but now they may also hold the secret to some new scientific discoveries. Pretty amazing stuff, don't you think?