SuperWeed

I’ve been meaning to send everybody over to a relatively new blog started up by Debra Durham of the International Association for Animal Trauma and Recovery. An ethologist and primatologist with a particular interest in trauma recover and a good grounding in feminist theory, Durham uses the Reading Animals blog to share her often very thought-provoking reflections on the books she’s reading.

Let me direct you particularly to a recent post on telling animals’ stories, which brings both feminist standpoint theory and psychological research on trauma recovery to the question of how to listen to and talk about nonhuman animals.

I’ve been having some conversations about trauma recovery among nonhuman animals with Durham’s Kerulos Center colleague, Gay Bradshaw, who you may remember from the remarkable NYT Magazine story on PTSD among elephants a couple of years ago. Of course, here at the sanctuary, we have developed a method of rehabilitation for former fighting roosters, which was developed with principles of trauma recovery in mind. One of the most important principles is the restoration of connections. Since birds are social animals, that’s important for them too. So, with the roosters as with all birds here, we understand that the most significant healing will occur not by our hands but via interactions with other birds. Or job is to create a safe space for those interactions and then, often, get out of the way.

So, let me share two short stories — just anecdotes, actually — that illustrate the idea that birds can offer to traumatized other birds things that we cannot.

Heartbeat and Octagon
One day, I was out in one of the foraging yards, feeling laid low by sorrow. Suddenly overcome with a sense of weakness on a sunny afternoon, I crouched down in the grass to gather myself before going on with my midday chores. Then, a flurry of feathers and an awkward thump. It took me a moment to make sense of what had happened: The young “broiler” rooster who had arrived earlier that day had jumped onto my shoulder and was peering at me intently, seeming to be quite concerned about me. “Yes, I do need a friend right now,” I said to him, “Let’s be friends forever.”

It’s rare for a chicken to perch on you unless the two of you have known each other a very long time. And, because they have been made ungainly by the genetic depredations of the poultry industry, it’s particularly difficult for a “broiler” rooster to accomplish the maneuver of jumping onto someone’s shoulder. So, needless to say, I was very impressed by this friendly newcomer.

I called him “Heartbeat” and he was my little friend. Every time I would come into the chicken yards, I would call out, “Heartbeat, Heartbeat! Where’s my little friend?” and he would come running to greet me.

A couple of weeks later, another young “broiler” chicken arrived fresh from a fall from a transport truck headed for the slaughter factory. The young hen, who I ended up calling Octagon because she had an oddly angular body, was a bit bruised up about the head but not so severely injured that she needed to be confined to the infirmary yard. (Whenever possible, we try to put birds right into the coop/yard where they will live permanently because they get so attached to each other that transitions are difficult. The infirmary coop/yard for elderly and injured birds is always full of birds who no longer need to be there but don’t want to leave their friends.)

Still, this young bird was very shaken by her recent experiences and I felt hesitant to leave her to her own devises. What she needed was a friend. A friend? The proverbial lightbulb went on over my head: Heartbeat! Carrying the young bird into the yard where the “broiler” chickens forage, I called out, “Heartbeat, Heartbeat! Where’s my little friend?”

Heartbeat came running. I set the young hen down on the ground. Heartbeat slowly circled the little bird, pausing to look intently at each scrape and bruise. Then he stood very still, seeming to not know what to do. After a long moment, he gently lowered himself to the ground, making the sound that mother hens make when they soothe their chicks. The young hen, who had been standing as if petrified, relaxed and laid herself down beside him. They spent the afternoon resting in the shade together. He showed her how to go into the coop that night. She stuck close to him for the next few days, gradually feeling more comfortable foraging with others until she was fully integrated into the flock.

Of course, what struck me most strongly was Heartbeat’s evident empathy for an injured stranger. Here was a very young bird who had known only grief himself until relatively recently but still had room in his heart to see and respond to the pain of somebody else. I still choke up when I think back on that moment when he stood there wondering what to do. But what I’m thinking about these days is how he was able to offer that hen curative factors that I simply could not provide. He could speak to her in her own language and offer her the all-important feeling of being connected to safe others of your own species.

Chumbawamba and the Ducks
Birds can also offer effective empathy and companionship to birds not of their own species, again providing curative factors that humans cannot offer. Ducks are especially social animals. I’ve often noticed that the former foie gras factory inmates who share the “broiler” chickens’ foraging yard often seem more interested in newcomers than do the chickens. Many times, the chickens continue to go about their business when I bring a new bird into the yard but the ducks hurriedly gather round. They stand in a semi-circle, close enough to get a good look but not so close as to provoke fear, and alternate between craning their necks to look at the new arrival and talking to each other (presumably about what they see). Look, talk, look, talk… on and on it goes until they have exhausted their interest and go back to whatever they were doing before the arrival of the new bird. The ducks are exceptionally deferential to young newcomers who haven’t yet figured everything out. They will, for example, hang back and wait patiently rather than rushing past if a new bird is balking by the entrance to the coop in the evening. The young chickens can sense the benevolence of the interest of the ducks and often choose to spend time with them or even follow them around.

Perhaps you remember the hook from the hit song Tubthumping by the band Chumbawamba: “I get knocked down but I get up again, ain’t never gonna keep me down.” That lyric inspired the name of a “broiler” rooster who arrived at the sanctuary with a broken leg, a broken wing, a broken beak, and bruises all over his face. After many weeks of hand-feeding and other nursing in our infirmary yard, he was finally ready to join the general population. He still had a bit of a limp but was otherwise fine. Who did he choose as companions? Roosters his own age? Older hens who might mother him? No, he chose to tag along after the ducks. There they were, all day every day, the ducks moving from place to place in the yard, with little Chumbawamba limping along behind them… the ducks settling down for a midday nap, with little Chumbawamba right in the middle of the bunch… the ducks grazing from low-lying branches and little Chumbawamba jumping up in the air, doing his best to imitate them. Unfortunately, like so many “broiler” roosters, Chumbawamba succumbed to a heart attack while still short of his second birthday. But still, thanks to the ducks, he had a happy and interesting life during the months that he was here with us. And, again, the ducks offered him “bird things” that no amount of human affection could give him.

June 2nd, 2008 | Category: Birds, Sanctuary, Trauma | Subscribe to comments | Leave a comment | Trackback URL