Some stew, some are soothed as chickens flourish on Kaua'i
By Jan TenBruggencate
Advertiser Kaua'i Bureau
LIHU'E, Kaua'i — Wild chickens are crowing and pecking their way across the Kaua'i landscape in unprecedented numbers — enough that it's got some folks worried.
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"I took my parents out to Ke'e beach ... and there were, like, 30 chickens as you walked out onto the beach. I couldn't believe it," said Sue Kanoho, executive director of the Kaua'i Visitors Bureau.
A hen and five of her chicks march at the base of the stairs of the Historic County Building in Lihu'e on Kaua'i.
Kaua'i's chicken population has hit the big time. It has been the subject of recent articles in major newspapers across the country from the Miami Herald to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, and it also has a significant presence on the Web: Do a Google search for "Kaua'i chickens" and you get more than 2,000 responses.
"I think we're getting on the verge of out of control," Kanoho said. She said she is concerned about possible impacts on tourism and said she will be discussing with tourism and government officials the proliferation of chickens, along with whether and how they could be controlled.
The chickens don't seem to be worried.
"They're so nonchalant. They strut around with the blank stares and self-assured swagger of high-end fashion models," said Minneapolis Star-Tribune reporter Chris Welsch, a recent island visitor who wrote about them last year. Welsch told The Advertiser he finds Kaua'i's chickens charming most of the time, but not at bedtime.
Wild chickens inhabit every part of the island. Back yards, golf courses, beaches, hotel grounds, public streets, parks and forests. There is no good estimate of numbers. Kids like to feed them and tourists like to photograph them. But a lot of folks are offended by them, particularly just after midnight.
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"There was a rooster nearby who could scream like Little Richard, and he started wailing at about 1:30 a.m. and never stopped. If I had some way to catch him, we would have had chicken fricassee the next day," Welsch said of spending a night at a cabin in the mountains at Koke'e State Park.
"They strut around with ... the self-assured swagger of high-end fashion models," said Chris Welch, a Minneapolis Star-Tribune Reporter and recent Kaua'i visitor.
Many residents are accustomed to the cock-a-doodling.
"I've gotten overwhelmingly positive comments from residents. They go somewhere else and they can't sleep because there are no chickens," said Kaua'i Humane Society director Becky Rhoades.
Kaua'i has no established mongoose population, which may explain why Kaua'i chickens do so much better than ones on other islands.
The Kauai chicken problem is almost as bad as in Key West, Fla., where a $20 per-chicken bounty was established this year.
Old-timers on the Garden Isle know that chickens have been around as long as people have, but most agree that the numbers escalated after 1982's Hurricane 'Iwa, which broke down chicken coops across the island, releasing the animals into the wild.
"That was the storm that really caused the chickens to be dispersed," Rhoades said.
Although most Kaua'i chickens are primarily the domestic variety, some carry the blood of the red jungle fowl — moa in Hawaiian — that Polynesian voyagers carried across the Pacific with them.
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One supposed clue to jungle fowl heritage is that, unlike domestic chickens, the jungle fowl tend to be monogamous, with cocks assisting hens in caring for a brood of chicks. With domestic fowl, the hens are left alone to fend for their offspring, although on Kaua'i you'll occasionally see a mated rooster and hen proudly escorting their keiki across a parking lot.
A hen and a pair of chicks wander in the parking lot at the state office building on Kaua'i. It is legal to catch chickens in residential areas, but not on state land, where chickens are considered wild birds.
Roosters of either kind can be loud.
"There are complaints like, 'I will never come back again,' " Kanoho said. Mainly, those complaints come from visitors who have stayed in residential areas, where chicken populations seem to be higher.
"It's not too big a problem in the resort properties," she said.
Partly, that's because resorts sometimes hire chicken trappers.
"I'm out there every day and I don't have enough traps, it's such a big problem," said Mark Ruiz of M&D Trapping. His clients include resorts, restaurants and some residents.
"There's one area in Lihu'e that's the worst I've seen. There's one home where they're feeding the chickens and all the neighbors are going crazy. One lady, the chickens have destroyed her yard. It's hard for me to catch them because they're so well-fed, but I'm getting them slowly," Ruiz said.
Ruiz gives trapped chickens to farmers or he releases them away from residential areas.
Trapper Larry Saito of Hogbusters said chickens were taking so much time that he stopped trapping them and instead started selling traps to people with chicken problems.
"We've sold close to 200 traps," he said.
Rhoades said the humane society will lend traps or make referrals to trappers, and will euthanize chickens brought to its Kipu shelter.
The Kaua'i chicken is a tough bird. Many fly long distances to escape danger. They often sleep in trees, where they avoid dogs and other predators. They can be aggressive, and hens will readily take on a cat to protect chicks.
It is legal to catch chickens in residential areas, where they are considered domestic fowl. But it is illegal to capture them on state property, where they are considered wild birds, said Thomas Kaiakapu, wildlife manager with the state Division of Forestry and Wildlife.
"If they're on your property, you can catch them and put them in the pot," he said.
Reach Jan TenBruggencate at jant@honoluluadvertiser.com or (808) 245-3074.
