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Chicken Eyeglasses
- thomassmith65 1y agoI looked this up after hearing about them on ABC's If You're Listening podcast: https://abc.net.au/listen/programs/if-youre-listening/skunk-oil-and-the-butcher-girl/105387440 https://abc.net.au/listen/programs/if-youre-listening/skunk-...
- MaDeuce 1y agoAnd contact lenses too. A HBS case study I remember from grad school: "Optical Distortion, Inc" A new product, contact lenses for chickens, is to be introduced by a small firm formed to market the product. An entry strategy must be planned including price, sales force, size, and location. Allows data for computation of economic benefit to farmers. Includes state-by-state chicken population data for planning a rollout sales program. https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=17120 https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=17120
- conradev 1y agoLooks like he actually tried it: But some ideas cannot be crushed by bankruptcy and the dream of providing lenses to all of America’s hens was carried on by the son of one of Vision Control Inc.’s founders, a young Mr. Randall Wise. Wise, a Harvard Business school graduate and former nautical shipping consultant, used the millions he made from selling his software company to establish Animalens, Inc. Instead of pecking at each other (success!), the hens were now pecking at the air, rubbing their eyes repeatedly on their wings, and suffering from corneal ulcers and ruptured eyes. https://www.vice.com/en/article/chickens-wore-sunglasses-indoors-before-it-was-cool/ https://www.vice.com/en/article/chickens-wore-sunglasses-ind...
- ortusdux 1y agoA friend had a job in the 70's at a research lab, and one of their duties was to use a hot iron to curl the beaks of each incoming batch of chicks, to help prevent pecking. They called the tasking "giving the chickens lips". I like the glasses solution a bit better.
- WastedCucumber 1y agoI don't get it though - how does this help prevent pecking? The only reasoning seems to be in the 1911 article, where it suggests they're made to protect the chickens' eyes.
- 07d5602d5e488e3 1y agoend of the first paragraph > the coloring was thought to prevent a chicken wearing them from recognizing blood on other chickens, which may increase the tendency for abnormal injurious behavior
- Levitating 1y ago> One variety used rose-colored lenses, as the coloring was thought to prevent a chicken wearing them from recognizing blood on other chickens So that's only relevant tot the rose-colored variant. I think the answer lies in this quote right above it: > They differ from blinders in that they allow the bird to see forward, whereas blinders do not. Where "blinders" is a hyperlink to an article concerning blinders for chickens. That article has a piece comparing blinders to spectacles: > Blinders work by reducing the accuracy of pecking at the feathers or body of another bird, rather than spectacles which have coloured lenses and allow the bird to see forwards but alter the perceived colour, particularly of blood. But this again only refers to the coloured lenses, which in the article was said to be a variant. So my understanding is that both blinders and spectacles work by restricting the vision of the bird but the spectactles additionally had a rose-colored variant.
- b112 1y agoYou must have missed this in the wikipedia page, but they're hinged. So when they look down (which for a chicken means bending their neck), they can see the ground and their feed. When looking ahead, their vision is obscured and blurry, opaque, so they won't attack or eat other chickens. (the red is an additional option)
- Levitating 1y ago
- smusamashah 1y agoI can not find pictures of chicken wearing those particular glasses depicted in this Wikipedia article.
- CompoundEyes 1y agoThis made my day.
- wormius 1y agoWe owned this game growing up: https://magisterrex.wordpress.com/2010/04/13/the-best-classic-board-games-the-inventors-1974/ https://magisterrex.wordpress.com/2010/04/13/the-best-classi... It has those goggles in it. Still remember fondly to this day (not the game, the chicken goggles).
- neuroelectron 1y ago[flagged]
- thomassmith65 1y agoIn this case, the source was a podcast, as I pointed out when I posted: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44244706 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44244706
- kylecazar 1y agoWell, I know more about abnormal injurious behavior in birds than I did an hour ago
- WD-42 1y agoThe fact that this article doesn’t include any images of chickens wearing said goggles is an injustice.
- Aloisius 1y agohttps://www.lazerhorse.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Cannibal-Chickens-Paper-Article.jpg https://www.lazerhorse.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Cannib...
- herval 1y agoLooks cooler than I expected!
- heckelson 1y agothis is a dapper looking chicken!
- FirmwareBurner 1y agoDope drip. Missing a cigarette and a leather jacket.
- ErigmolCt 1y agoYou almost want to laugh, but then you remember this was meant to fix a system that pushed animals so hard they turned on each other.
- dvh 1y agoI had a theory, long supported by things like astatine, quantum computing or graphene, that if top-right Wikipedia image doesn't contain photo then the subject is either not real or not practical.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- wat10000 1y agoNeither “arithmetic” nor “algorithm” have photos.
- raptorraver 1y agoNowadays they do the same using red lights in industrial egg production, if pecking becomes a problem in a flock.
- snickerbockers 1y ago[flagged]
- tomcam 1y agoChickens are hilarious and surprisingly adorable. All plans of eating ours went right out the window when I brought home the first wave of day-old chicks. They can be very mean to each other. “Pecking order” is literally true and the results can be heartbreaking. Ours have never pecked each other’s eyes, thank heaven, but I’m guessing most of that is from the roosters, not the hens. Roosters can get disgustingly rapey and have to be separated from the hens, who can get seriously injured during the mating process.
- natmaka 1y agoI heard from someone who raised chicken that they are way more agressive towards each other when their diet lacks adequate proteins.
- eMPee584 1y agoLow Protein intake => low neurotransmitter levels => lower emotional balance / control is a causal chain I've learned about a few years ago from a therapist named Julia Ross who treated thousands of patients with this insight and published three books about it, the most recent one (The craving cure) being a comprehensive practical resource about this phenomenon. It seems to be a major factor in depression, addiction, obesity, and dysfunctional social behaviour.. and little surprise it affects chicken, too. In my view, we have massive problems (child brain development, social problems) in the world because of protein scarcity, as capitalism excels providing everyone with ample cheap carbs but cheap sustainable protein, not so much. I dream of open source bioreactors for algae (spirulina etc) too boost availability of Protein & Omega 3 (which is another hugely undersupplied nutrient, esp. in non-coastal regions and as appetite for sunflower-fried batter goes up, because Omega 6 cancels out 3).. here in Dresden, we have a small start-up https://algenwerk.de https://algenwerk.de that is trying to commercialize it but the cost really has to be brought down a lot, rn one jar is about 8€ for some green goo that tastes like nothing, but it has potential and they are a talented team.
- dillydogg 1y agoI'm no dietitian, but for the "cheap, broadly available protien" I think beans and lentils fit the bill. I do not know if they are sustainable, which you mention as a requirement in your post, but surely plant based is more sustainable than meat.
- miohtama 1y agoIs the driver of behaviour having too many chickens packed in too small space?
- chmod775 1y agoNo. Chickens have a tendency to gang up on sick and injured chickens and quite literally peck them to death. This has been observed long before we started cramming them into tiny spaces, but it certainly doesn't help.
- spookie 1y agoAs a rural guy can confirm. Also, the males, become quite agressive past 4 months of age. They also grow sizeable spurs hard as nails, usually these are trimmed if you have more than one rooster. Roosters will attempt to kill chicks occasionally, although they usually do a great job protecting them from predators. They are able to scare foxes sometimes :)
- Aardwolf 1y agoThe article talks in the past tense, but doesn't mention what it got replaced with. Searching for it reveals pink plastic chicken glasses for sale today, so they still seem to exist. Or maybe those are blinders instead
- FiddlerClamp 1y agoI remember these! A board game I played as a kid in the 1970s, "The Inventors," had chicken eyewear protection as an invention. Pic available at: https://boardgamegeek.com/image/817261/the-inventors https://boardgamegeek.com/image/817261/the-inventors
- hermitcrab 1y agoAlternatively, we could treat fellow sentient beings with a bit of empathy and respect and not cram thousands of them into an artificial environment. Then we wouldn't have to cram them full of antibiotics, cut their beaks off and make them wear 'cute' glasses.
- KetoManx64 1y agoDon't buy eggs/chickens from companies that treat them like that. Buy from local farms or eggs labeled as pasture raised while grocery shopping. You're not supporting the awful conditions and also getting eggs that have more nutrition content/egg.
- goda90 1y agoMaybe there's a negative I'm not aware of, but I personally look for pasture raised eggs that are certified by this organization: https://certifiedhumane.org/ https://certifiedhumane.org/ I can often find them for only $2 more a dozen than the cheapest option.
- jedimastert 1y agoI love humanely and ethically raised chickens, but let's not pretend they aren't dumb as rocks. The happiest chickens in the world with all the pasture and food in the world will still fight each other for no other reason than "because". Admittedly a lot less but still happens
- BriggyDwiggs42 1y agoIt’s not a refutation though. Dumb doesn’t seem to preclude suffering in humans; I’d assume chickens can still have a bad time.
- hermitcrab 1y agoWe don't live in a perfect world, and we never will. But that isn't a good excuse not to try to do better.
- 1y ago
- ErigmolCt 1y agoThe idea that we once mass-produced rose-tinted chicken glasses to curb pecking violence is peak “solutions in search of a problem” energy - but also a fascinating glimpse into pre-industrial animal welfare hacks.
- gweinberg 1y agoThis was one of the the wacky inventions featured in Parker Brothers' Inventors board game. As I recall the game itself wasn't very good, no real strategy. At the time I thought the parachute hat was most likely to actually prove useful, but I was a kid, this was like 50 years ago.