Why Don’t Chickens Fly?

Violet (age 11) asked,

“Why don’t chickens fly?”

Thanks for your question, Violet!

Chickens come from a fowl kind. When God created birds during creation week, he created this fowl kind with genes (the information that determines a creature’s traits) to produce chickens.

Some people may not know that chickens can fly, just not for long distances like other birds. Why?

To fly long distances, birds need a certain wing length to support their body mass (weight). But the barnyard chickens we see on farms today have small wings and large, heavy bodies and flight muscles. This keeps them from staying in the air for long periods of time.

Thomas Quine, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons

Humans have domesticated, or tamed, many breeds of chickens for meat and eggs. Over the years, we have bred chickens for certain traits (called selective breeding) like bigger muscles, which give us more meat to enjoy.

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