The selective breeding of chickens in the last 50 years has led to the entire breed showing health issues that could make them useless as chickens.

Last spring I bought two female pot belly piglets. I put them in my animal pen with my goats & chickens and other assorted animals (6 gay roosters, a duck that has sex with a chicken, and two goats that like to hump the pigs). I also have a little Jack Russell Terrier I call the "Little Pig F#%*er". Full story and pictures of the cross breed.

Doom mongering has suddenly crept back into fashion. A new breed of Chicken Littles has emerged. But these aren't your run-of-the-mill street corner nut jobs warning that the end is nigh. Rather, these are serious thinkers with excellent credentials.

Artist Koen Vanmechelen's Cosmopolitan Chicken Project, aims for a hybridized breed of chicken that is not focused on notions of specific purity or nationality.

Pam educates Rostik regarding KFC's abuse of chickens: “KFC's suppliers breed chickens to grow so top-heavy that they suffer heart attacks, lung failures, broken legs, and other crippling diseases and injuries. At slaughter, their throats are cut open and they are scalded to death — often while they are still conscious.”

The Blue Hen Chicken was adopted on April 14, 1939 as the state bird of Delaware. The University of Delaware mascot, known as YoUDee, is also modeled after the bird.The reason behind the notoriety of this bird can be traced back to the Revolutionary War. On December 9, 1775, the Continental Congress resolved that a military battalion was to be raised from Delaware, then known as the Lower Counties on the Delaware. Thus, the Delaware regiment was born--a group composed of eight companies representing New Castle, Kent and Sussex Counties.The second company was composed of men from Kent County and was under the command of Capt. John Caldwell, who was an avid fan and owner of gamecocks. The troops often amused themselves by staging cock fights with a breed known as the Kent County Blue Hen, recognizable for its blue plumage.The renown of these chickens spread rapidly during the time when cock fighting was a popular form of amusement, and the "Blue Hens' Chickens" developed quite a reputation for ferocity and fighting success. Capt. Caldwell's company likewise acquired a considerable reputation for its own fighting prowess, in engagements with the British at Long Island, White Plains, Trenton and Princeton, and soon it was nicknamed "Caldwell's Gamecocks."Capt. Caldwell's company was part of Col. John Haslet's first Delaware regiment that reported for duty near the outset of the American Revolution in January 1776. In August 1781, remnants of the regiment were still battling at Eutaw Springs, South Carolina. Although often referred to as "The Fighting Delawares," Haslet's regiment also won the nickname, "The Blue Hens' Chickens," and that name was formally adopted by the Delaware General Assembly in 1939 when the Blue Hen Chicken was named the official state bird.The University of Delaware's College of Agriculture & Natural Resources maintains a breeding group of the Blue Hen Chicken on the campus farm. ReferencesUniversity of Delaware Fightin' Blue Hens