Stand back, FOWL beast!
This is Sandra Tsing Loh with the Loh Down on Science.
Hawaii has a feral chicken problem! The population has EXPLODED! And they destroy fruit trees. Farmers are P-O’d! But where did they come from?
Enter Eben Gering, from Michigan State University. He collected chickens from different regions, and compared their D-N-A, plumage, and vocalizations.
And? They’re a HYBRID of native red junglefowl and white domesticated chickens. Gering believes farm chickens escaped thirty years ago in a hurricane, and mated with their wild cousins.
Could they just die out eventually? Not likely, says Gering. Domestic chicken genes may help the endangered junglefowl survive and continue their destructive rampage. He says hunting might be the only solution.
Hear that, hybrid chicken? Cluck with the best, cry like the rest.
Reference: Gering, E., Johnsson, M., Willis, P., Getty, T., & Wright, D. (2015). Mixed ancestry and admixture in Kauai’s feral chickens: invasion of domestic genes into ancient Red Junglefowl reservoirs. Molecular ecology, 24(9), 2112–2124. https://doi.org/10.1111/mec.13096