Xena – Warrior Chicken

One Wednesday in August at dusk, me and a friend were driving home from catching up when we found ourselves behind a truck full of ex-battery hens headed for slaughter. This is not something I had ever seen, nor had she, so the only thing to do was follow this truck and follow we did. We followed the truck for a long time. We watched as feathers flew continually in to our windscreen. We pointed out the hens we could see who were struggling and trapped to each other, there were lots. It was one of those times that I did not have my camera with me. One of those rare times that I left my camera at home because nothing could possible need documenting during a catch up with a friend right? Wrong!

We followed the truck to a small chicken abattoir. The truck backed in and started unloading his crates. We waited a little while and then started rescuing hens. These poor girls had been unloaded in their crates and were to be left there overnight and be slaughtered in the morning. Each crate was jammed packed with hens. Each crate had several dead hens in it, they had died on the journey from being roughly handled and squashed in to the crates. My friend and I loaded the car with hens and left. Later that night, my friend returned with another friend and they continued to rescue hens. In total that night, 74 hens were rescued from that abattoir.

There was one hen who was found in a terrible situation. Xena was found with her leg caught between two extremely heavy crates. She had obviously fell out of the top of the pallet when the forklift took them off the truck. She had landed between crates and was stuck there hanging. She was hanging there for roughly 9 hours before my friends found her. It took a huge effort for those two friends to move the two incredibly heavy steel bars that were holding up crates of chickens. It took them a while, but they finally got her out. She was rushed home and given emergency critical care.

The photos below are from my friends phone when they found her hanging.

Xena visited the Burwood Bird Vet the next day and x-rays showed that she had a leg that was broken in several places and damage to her spine.  It would require surgery to pin her leg together but first Xena had to be strong enough for surgery. Like all the other hens there that night, Xena was emaciated, weak and unwell. All of them would have been starved for several days (if not more) before depopulation started. These hens were all very young, younger than the usual 18 months of age that hens usually get depopulated at.

Xena at the vet.

Xena spent 2 weeks getting around the clock care from my friend.  We were all terrified that she wouldn’t make it and that the decision would have to be made to put her to sleep. The warrior chicken’s next appointment showed miraculous healing however. Her leg and spine had started healing on their own! No surgery was needed because her body was healing itself. She will return to the vet for x-rays weekly, but it seems this fighter of a hen will live.

She survived the egg farm. She survived transport. She survived hanging 9 hours with her leg crushed. She survived the abattoir. This is one warrior chicken!

Please don’t use my images without permission. All images are Copyright Tamara Kenneally