North West Island feral chicken's incredible survival story

Australia Broadcast Center

4 days ago

Robinson Crusoe never laid an egg.
But don't let that stop comparisons with this little-known breed of bush chook.
In the pantheon of desert island survival stories, the North West Island feral fowl deserves its own place alongside Daniel Defoe's fictional character.
This breed of chicken endured abandonment, starvation and near-constant predation to survive on an island with no permanent fresh water source for about a century.
Its story has captured the fascination of poultry conservationists like Logan-based John Urane, who made it his life's mission to save the breed from extinction.
In the 1880s, a global guano boom led to the rapid development of mines as countries tapped into rich deposits of bat droppings for use as natural fertiliser.
One such operation was established on North West Island — an unremarkable outcrop about 30 kilometres off the central Queensland coast.
"From then, the island was not occupied until about 1924, when a turtle soup factory was established.
"That lasted for about four years … and then there was no human habitation, other than visitors to the island, up until 1980 when it became a national park."
For that entire century of basic abandonment, these chooks were beset by feral cats that, presumably, also arrived with those early guano miners.
To make matters worse, North West Island was missing one important element for sustaining life.
"But there's a grass that grows [on the island] called bird's beak grass, and the birds developed a technique to harvest water off the leaves."
Cereal grains, which typically make up the bulk of a chicken's diet, were non-existent.
"So, the birds' diet was varied from figs from the fig trees that grow on the island to insects, mice, turtles that washed up, or dead fish," Mr Urane said.
"A high protein diet — cockroaches, but no cereal grain as such."
The durability of these birds was so extraordinary that several scientists have investigated them over the years.
"Glenorchy McBride studied the birds and estimated that their numbers would increase to about 1,500 annually, and they'd be trimmed back to about 500 individual birds by the feral cats," Mr Urane said.
"When Parks and Wildlife eventually poisoned, trapped and shot the feral cats to remove them, they recorded over 100 cats."
The only time the chooks were safe from predation was during the annual breeding migration of muttonbirds to the island.
"The feral fowl could come to the ground, raise their chicks, build their numbers up.
"Only the smartest, and those who were best able to survive the cat predation, were the ones that passed on their genetics to future generations."
That constant predation has made these chooks very skittish operators — and it affected their behaviour in other ways, too.
"I had a trio — a rooster and two hens," Mr Urane said.
"One of the hens laid eggs and she started to incubate.
"The second hen, she just went about her business until the chicks arrived — and she immediately displayed the same behaviour as a broody hen, a clucky hen with a chick.
"She would call them and feed them."
The cock was also something of an oddball.
"He'd also brood the chicks at night.
"That's unheard of [among other breeds] … but with feral fowl, it's a family affair."
Work to clear North West Island of feral animals began when it was declared part of Capricornia National Park in 1980.
That included the wholesale slaughter of those pesky cats — but it also meant the removal of chickens.
Fortunately, a handful of poultry enthusiasts rescued and bred some of them in isolation from other run-of-the-mill chooks.
Rare Breeds Trust poultry coordinator Susan Locke said protecting breeds like the North West Island feral fowl from extinction was of huge scientific and historical importance.
"The North West Island feral fowl and the King Island turkey — which are both 'in-the-wild' breeds if you like — are of great scientific value for studying the characteristics of poultry in a non-controlled environment," she said.
"Exhibition breeds tend to be highly selected for form and colour by breeders, but these breeds respond to entirely natural environments in breeding and survival.
"Their genetics are important for biodiversity studies in environments where they effectively need to survive and adapt to natural conditions themselves."
Mr Urane is the latest in that line of custodians fighting to keep these bloodlines alive.
"I'd like to see more people dedicated to preserving the future of these birds," he said.
"Although we've established satellite flocks in Queensland, there are certainly fewer than a dozen populations.
"As long as they're not interbred with other breeds of poultry that exists. Once that occurs, you've basically just got a chicken."