Canadian chicken tries to cross road, doesn't make it

It's a lazy, sunny September day here in Fort Mudge. Kind of a slow day, as Sundays sometimes are. Must be the same at CBC News, which ran a story about a chicken trying to cross the road in Hamilton ON. I hope CBC won't mind my republishing it, word for word. It's too good not to share, and so good that it doesn't need any embellishment.

Why did the chicken cross the road? One chicken in Hamilton tried to live out the old joke. The bird was stopping drivers as it wandered into traffic on Dundas Street in Dundas Thursday morning. Passers-by pulled over and got out of their cars as the chicken ran afoul, said one of those drivers, Andru Valpy.

Valpy called the Hamilton Police non-emergency line, who put him through to animal control services after a good laugh. "I didn't catch the joke at first," he said. "Sadly, the chicken did not make it to the other side. It was trying to go from the south side of Dundas to the north side of Dundas when I found him."

Animal Control instructed Valpy to grab the chicken from the road and look after it until they arrived. Before animal services got there, he took care of it for a half hour in the parking lot of a retirement home. "One of the neighbours gave (the chicken) some seed, made sure I was taken care of and the chicken was taken care of, more importantly," he said. The chicken is now recovering in the care of Animal Control.

So, why did the chicken attempt to cross the road? The answer is not clear. The neighbour believed the chicken could have flown from a passing truck carrying chickens, said Valpy. The chicken looked like it had been clipped. "We suspect it might have flown the coop and tried to start a new life," he said.

Animal Control told Valpy that if that were the case, the chicken would be going to a much better home now. "There's no yoking about that," Valpy said.