Wild Rooster, Kauai, Hawaii
The most common story told of why there are so many wild chickens (Common peafowl) running around Kauai is that Hurricane Iniki supposedly destroyed a number of chicken coops, thereby freeing many chickens, when it hit the island in 1992.
The wild chickens are both a blessing and a curse on Kauai. They can be a nuisance when trying to sleep later in the morning, because the roosters start crowing just before dawn; or when trying to take an afternoon nap, and the roosters are still crowing.
However, the chickens are lucky because apparently they are not tasty: locals like to joke that if you were to boil a wild chicken and a lava rock together, the lava rock would be the more tender of the two.
The chickens are beneficial because they eat cockroaches and centipedes, thereby helping with pest control.
© 2013 Cindy & Nick Tucey