09/17/99

When Chickens Turn Blue

... in response to "Raising Butterflies" (9/3/99)

Several people told me that they plan to raise butterflies, too, but when they looked a second time for the article, they couldn't find it. Titles of features articles cycle through the SNET Internet Home Page regularly; to find a complete list of weekly features, go to the top of the homepage to the horizontal navigation bar and click on "Features," or click on "Online Features" in the middle of the page.

After you read below about a project another family tried, will you write to me about one of yours? I know that other readers will appreciate knowing about them.

Dear Beth,

The raising butterflies column was a delight! I thank Kirsten Cooke and her children for being excited enough to share it with you and I also thank you for seeing this story's worth to a larger audience. A second grade class in our school system raised butterflies as a science project. It's the kind of hands-on experience which benefits everybody: kids obviously learn and appreciate it, but the teachers also get the benefit of renewal in witnessing their students' delight in learning.

My daughter's experience with hands-on learning was another science experiment (although I have some reservations about the implication that manipulating animal development for human interest is acceptable). She and a group of about 4 other kids raised chicken eggs, using food dye to color the developing embryo to determine if this process has any negative effects on the chick (it doesn't.)

While the experiment kind of flopped because only one chick in the first batch and two in the second actually hatched, the girls were still able to take the project to the science fair. They described the entire project quite well and concluded that they had insufficient data to reach a reasonable conclusion (rather than deciding the coloration process killed the chicks.)

The one colored chick that hatched was indeed blue. As it gained adult feathering, the blue was lost. A very interesting unintended aspect of the study was that the blue chick became very dependent on us humans, enjoyed riding our dog (the photographs are quite a sight) and loved to be petted.

The two chicks from the second batch, both of normal white coloring (a different variety than the 1st chick), did not develop an affinity for humans, much preferring their own company. (We named the rooster "Bogey" and the hen "Bacall," which may have had a lot to do with it.) Once the clue chick got too old to continue life in the suburbs, we placed it at a farm, which does riding therapy for humans with a variety of disorders. They also have a number of animals they use for "petting" therapy. That's what this chicken liked. The two white ones went to a small family mini-farm (and ultimately into the pot.) Before we embarked on the project at all, I had a home lined up for a dozen or two chicks, which is an important consideration when dealing with animals. After all, what do you do once they've "served their purpose?" Anyway, it was fun, educational and certainly entertaining, much like the butterfly project was.

***

A second reader, who also raises butterflies, wrote, "Better for the kids and yourself to get a real perspective on the wonders of metamorphosis of living things. I raise butterflies from the wild, too. They are called "red spotted purple" and "black swallowtail," two entirely different species collected from my garden, raised from eggs and returned to the wild as adults. Remember that your Monarch has to make a lengthy trip to Southern Central America every year. Raising butterflies sure beats technological entertainment; it's so difficult to divert children and adult attention from it these days."

LINK:

Science projects for different age groups

Please send questions or comments to bbruno@snet.net.