“I hope to share Peanut’s message that even if you’ve been rejected or maybe feel like a misfit, you can still find someone to connect with and have a long, productive life,” the chicken owner told The Washington Post.
Peanut is the oldest chicken in the world.
Marsi Parker Darwin now considers the bird part of her family, but if the retired Michigan librarian hadn’t discovered Peanut trapped in an apparently rotten egg 21 years ago, she wouldn’t be alive to claim her title, according to The Washington Post.
More than two decades ago, Darwin, now 71, came across a rotten, abandoned chicken egg that she believed would never hatch. She was ready to throw the egg into the lake (where it would become food for the turtles) when she heard a sound coming from it.
“I heard a second chirp and realized that the chicken was alive and had no teeth to come out of the shell,” she said. Postan observation she made after seeing a tiny, barely visible crack in the egg’s exterior.
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After “gently peeling it out of the egg”, she saw a brown spotted bird that would become her companion for the first time.
“There was this wet little mess sitting in my hand,” she recalled of that moment.
When Peanut’s mother refused to accept her, Darwin decided that she would take care of her. She put the newly born chick under a light bulb and taught it to eat and drink.
With a little TLC, the bird grew, but its weight peaked at about a pound, just one-third the size of the farmer’s other chickens, according to Post. The small stature of this “maladapted” bird is what earned it the name “Peanut”, but – clearly – size is not everything.
In January, at age 20, Peanut was named the world’s oldest living chicken by Guinness World Records. She turned 21 in May.
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“The average chicken lives five to eight years, so it’s a great achievement,” Darwin said of her plucky hen’s high honor.
Although the bird doesn’t let her newfound fame get to her head, she’s always been a bit of a diva.
“Peanut is a cheeky little chick — if she doesn’t eat blueberry yogurt in the morning, I’m definitely hearing about it,” she told Postadding that a “healthy” and “spoiled” hen likes grapes and bananas.
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But poultry also has a softer side.
“She’s friendly and pretty good with everyone, including our dogs and cats,” Darwin said.
During the winter, he keeps Peanut in the front pocket of his jacket while he goes about his business—he lives on a no-kill farm with dogs, cats, and birds—and even though the hen is very slow moving now, she always comes when Darwin calls her Name. She is also a maza.
“Peanut likes to sit on my lap and watch TV,” the farmer said of the bird. “I think she just likes the warmth of snuggling.”
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Although Peanut now lives with Darwin and her husband Bill – the hen and her 15-year-old daughter Millie have a coop in the living room – she hasn’t always lived inside.
After spending the first few years in the living room, Darwin decided it was time to move Peanut into the coop.
Peanut (right) and her daughter Millie (left).
Guinness world record
Although she found “a ragtag crew to hang out with,” the tiny hen was a bit disturbed by the other chickens, Darwin said. Post. More than a decade and many girls later, Peanut has decided that the outdoor life is no longer for her.
One cold day six years ago, a hen followed her owner onto the porch and refused to come back out. “We had an old parrot cage stored in there, so I put some straw, food and water in it, and that was it,” Darwin said. “She has chosen her home for the winter.”
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For several years, Peanut refused to return to the coop – she even brought her friends with her.
One day she approached the screened porch with “a little line behind her,” according to Darwin. “Four other chickens are also wanted.”
“Chickens don’t get a lot of credit — they’re really smart,” she said Post. “They knew it was warmer there.”
As time went on and Peanut got older, she decided the chicken could move in, so she set up permanent quarters for her and Millie in the living room facing the window. The mother-daughter duo still go outside when it’s warm.
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Peanut’s life inspired Darwin so much that she self-published a children’s book about the chicken entitled: My girlfriend Kikiriki and I — about love and life from the oldest chicken in the world.
Here’s hoping there are many more pages left in Peanut’s story of losers. “I like the old girl quite a bit and I hope she lives to see a few more birthdays,” Darwin said Post her feathered friend.
Regardless, the Michigan farmer hopes Peanut fans will take something from her life beyond his record-breaking longevity.
Darwin hopes to “share Peanut’s message that even if you’ve been rejected or feel like a misfit, you can still find someone to connect with and have a long, productive life.”
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Source: HIS Education