The Private Life of Chickens

What goes on inside a chicken brain? Presenter Jimmy Doherty sets out on a quest to reveal the hidden lives of chickens, a bird we often take for granted.

Jimmy travels to a farm in Devon, UK, to illuminate the answers to his many questions. How do chickens communicate with their chicks? How are chickens able to look in two directions at once? Can hens really change sex? And is there really a pecking order?

Join in as we gradually unfold the life and behaviour of chickens. Although this documentary takes a main focus on free-roaming ecological chickens, we’ll also take a brief look at the human bred industrial chickens.

The many different breeds of chickens begs the questions: how far have we changed chicken nature?

Currently, humanity enjoys chicken meat so much that according to 2014 statistics, 51.4 billion chickens are artificially hatched, fattened up and slaughtered as 42-day-old babies every year globally.

Although there’s nothing wrong with eating chicken meat, we can still decide how chickens are killed. Education on the subject of the animals we eat could be a step in the right direction.

While chicken is a lean meat with loads of proteins, it is also high on cholesterol. However, chicken meat provides selenium which contains antioxidants that help control free radicals and improve your immune system.