"If only I could fly like this chicken, it would be great!" (Designed dialogue) Two flight routes: A small mother chicken from Changhua flew from the 7th floor to the opposite 3rd floor. It was said that if it didn't lay eggs soon, it would be eaten, what a sin! Reporter Wei Fen, photographer Jia Daitefei. Yesterday at 12:24, Mr. Li called: "I am a resident of Building 22 in Chaoming Garden. Just now, a chicken flew from the 7th floor of Building 17 across a distance of forty or fifty meters and landed on the third-floor awning across the street. I heard that this chicken was brought over from Lin'an. We all say that this chicken is about to become a flying chicken." After Mr. Li reported the news, he sent us a photo of the "flying chicken" perched on the awning. In the photo, there was a short and plump little hen with a bright red comb on its head, looking quite ordinary. However, "you can't judge a chicken by its appearance," Mr. Li said, as he personally witnessed the moment when this little hen spread its wings and took off. "I saw it shrug its shoulders, squat down its rear end, and then 'whoosh,' it flew out. It looked very majestic, continuously flapping its two wings like an eagle, flying quite steadily. It was the first time I had seen a chicken fly like this, and I was completely stunned."
"The Flying Chicken Feels Like an Eagle" The building 22 of Chaoming Garden is located at No. 1 Chaoming Temple Lane, directly facing Building 17 of Chaoming Garden. The owner of the chicken, Master Xu, lives on the 7th floor of Building 17. That astonishingly flying hen was placed in the corner of the stairs, inside a large cardboard box. "Now that I know it can fly, I have tied its legs with a rope." Master Xu lifted the cardboard box, tightly held the rope in his hand first, then carefully took the chicken out for us to see. As soon as the chicken came out of the cardboard box, it started clucking loudly, trying hard to escape from Master Xu's hands, shaking its comb, flapping its wings, and eyeing us warily. It wasn't very big, weighing about two catties, with one fully extended wing measuring less than 30 centimeters. When taking pictures of it, if you got too close, it would raise its shoulders, tilt its head, glare at you with sharp eyes, and look ready to fight. "It feels like photographing an eagle," said the accompanying photographer.
The feeling of flying is truly relaxing Around noon yesterday, Master Xu wanted to feed the hen and took it out of the cardboard box. "I prepared the food and thought to put the chicken back into the box. As I reached out to grab it, it 'whooshed' and flew away right before my eyes! My vision blurred, and when I looked again, it was gone. I leaned over the railing to look down but couldn't find it anywhere. I thought, did it accidentally fall into someone's car window and get driven away?" Master Xu and his wife searched downstairs for about an hour but still couldn't find it. They had no choice but to go back up. "When we just climbed to the fourth floor, I saw a chicken standing on the balcony awning of the third floor opposite! How strange, how did it get there? Could it have flown over itself? How could a chicken possibly fly so far!"
There was no one in the third-floor apartment, so Master Xu borrowed a clothes pole and went to a neighbor on the fourth floor, trying to drive the hen down, but it was out of reach. Master Xu also tried from the fifth floor at Mr. Li's balcony, but it was still out of reach. At this point, Master Xu's wife shouted from below that there was light in the adjacent third-floor apartment, meaning there might be someone inside. Master Xu had no choice but to knock on the door again. This time, the clothes pole could reach the hen, but unexpectedly, the hen "took off" again. "By this time, many people downstairs were watching! It took off from the third-floor awning and flew straight to a grape trellis on the ground floor of our building, where it finally rested. We were all amazed! The way it flew didn't seem like a chicken at all; it was effortless, looking just like a bird!"
If it doesn't lay eggs, it will meet its end Master Xu ran downstairs, knocked on the grape trellis, and the hen took off for the third time, diving into a shoe store on the first floor. Master Xu rushed in, closed the door, and finally caught the little hen. "When I wanted to put it back into the cardboard box, it pecked my hand, unwilling to go back in!" This chicken was given to Master Xu a few days ago by a friend's friend when he went to visit his friend in Lin'an. Master Xu said that the family raising the chickens lived in a rural area of Changhua in Lin'an. There were no mountains around, just fields. All their chickens were free-range, released during the day to eat wild grass and insects in the fields, drinking mountain spring water when thirsty, and fed some rice at night. "That friend said, city people like to eat old hens, and since there was nothing else to give, they gave me a hen that lays eggs. Unexpectedly, they gave me a flying chicken." Master Xu said that this hen was two years old and reportedly laid eggs every day in Changhua. On the ninth day of the month when he brought it to Hangzhou, it laid an egg in the cardboard box that same day! But perhaps due to the new environment, it hadn't laid any eggs since then. "If it still doesn't lay eggs, then it will be slaughtered for meat!" Master Xu said.
Both flight distances exceeded 30 meters How far did this hen fly? Measured by foot, the distance between Building 17 and Building 22 is approximately 32 meters. Calculating each floor's height to be about 3 meters, the "flying chicken" took off for the first time from the 7th floor to the opposite 3rd floor, with a vertical drop of about 13.5 meters, resulting in a flight distance of approximately 34.73 meters. The second takeoff was from the 3rd floor to the grape trellis on the 1st floor, with a drop of about 6 meters, resulting in a flight distance of approximately 32.56 meters. Although shorter than the previous flight, due to the smaller drop, it appeared more challenging to eyewitness Mr. Li, "it was almost like horizontal flight." The third takeoff, from the grape trellis on the 1st floor to the ground, is something an ordinary hen could do, thus negligible. Is the "flying chicken" rare? Though rare, the Express has reported on a "flying chicken" before— In November 2008, netizen "Huiyi" living in Qinqin Community, Yuyingfang, Sandon, reported to us via QQ: a chicken flew into my home from the opposite building! It wasn't noticed at the time, hiding under a flower pot on the balcony overnight. The next day, it was discovered, and as soon as anyone approached, it flew again, landing on a tree in the middle of the road. There was a pedestrian street between the two buildings, at least 30 meters wide.
"Rather eat a mouthful of flying chicken than half a pound of walking chicken" An online search revealed that there was a hen in Chongqing capable of flying over a hundred meters, earning the title of "fighter chicken" among hens. This video was uploaded online last July. Some netizens witnessed a spectacle while hiking in Xiushan County, Chongqing: dozens of "birds" suddenly flew out from the mountain top, flapping wildly through the sky, as if trained in light kung fu, flying over a distance of more than a hundred meters. It turned out these "birds" were actually local Xiushan native chickens, referred to as "the farthest flying chicken in history". It is said that these native chickens are raised freely in the mountains, feeding on grains, herbs, insects, and rainwater, with plenty of exercise. Their muscle fibers are extremely fine and long, allowing them to fly over a hundred meters at once and easily perch on treetops. There is a folk saying: "Rather eat a mouthful of flying chicken than half a pound of walking chicken." In Hangzhou, there are also people who raise "flying chickens." In Beilin Village, Tangbu, Yuhang District, Mei Lin Mountain Resort spans over 1,500 mu with bamboo forests, tea gardens, peach orchards, fish ponds, etc., and 6,000 "flying chickens" (divided into hens and capons) live here (Express reported on December 19th last year). The resort owner, He Jianhua, said that he raises the chickens entirely in the wild according to the original habits of pheasants. Thousands of chickens can all take off and fly from the ground while playing. "Although the exact distance hasn't been measured, generally capons fly farther than hens. The flight distance depends on the situation; when they play on their own, they usually fly seven or eight meters, but if someone tries to catch them, they can fly twenty or thirty meters." Old He jokingly said that when guests come to the resort to buy chickens, they let the guests catch them themselves, whichever they like. "Nine and a half times out of ten, they can't catch them." "We help catch them using specialized nets!" Old He said that "flying chickens" eat wild foods, have a large activity space, and fly frequently, making their meat taste as delicious as birds in the sky, "no need to add monosodium glutamate when cooking."