How to Hypnotize a Chicken: Two Easy Ways to Calm Birds

You can also do this by placing the bird on the ground with it's beak also on the ground. Place your finger at, but not touching the tip of the beak and draw a straight line in the dirt away from the bird. This is how I have always put birds under.

Lets go back to part where you lay the bird down: We have a terrorist rooster neighbor who prefers our space to it's own. He has been injuring anyone who is in the area. Pick him up and lay him down is not an option. I was able to drop a blanket over him once. Got him into a garbage can and slid back to his roost. He is on to me now. I need some more practical advice. And what do you do after the chicken is hypnotized?

A rooster that beats up hens or people, or even other roosters, is not a safe rooster to have around. Help him cross the rainbow bridge asap. Admittedly, I usually follow the "three strikes and you're out" rule. However, I've had flocks of chickens for 40 years. There is no rehabilitating a nasty rooster, they all rack up 3 strikes pretty quickly once they start acting out. His behavior will put the hens on edge and they lay fewer eggs. He'll hurt someone or injure another bird. When chickens see blood, they'll peck at it, thus exacerbating the pain of the wounded bird. I've had a puncture wound in my leg (luckily didn't get infected), scratches, and a guest stabbed in the buttocks with both of the rooster's feet. A child could have their eyes pecked. There are an unlimited number of roosters available (try the feed store, ours always has a free one someone brought in, waiting for adoption). Or raise your own brood and you'll always get about half roosters. Pick the nicest personality with the best configuration, and a bird that seems quite interested in kind leadership. They'll make it obvious as will the rest of the flock. You can keep a ratio of 1:10 roosters to hens for medium to large birds. The rest are soup.

Yes. You can also hypnotize a chicken by laying it on its side on the ground and drawing a line in the sand with your finger, right beside i its eye. The chicken will stare at the line, and lie quietly.

I believe this to be a prey response similar to a possum playing dead. Birds have stiff lungs that are supplied air via air sacs, so it shouldn't restrict breathing much, if any. Still, I have noted open mouth breathing when birds are on their backs, so I tend to restrict use of their tendency to go limp like this to things like treating SLM or trimming toenails. Holding a bird by the legs also produces a similar trance like state where they can be hung for slaughter or (in the case of a flighty bird) moved easily. Be careful of the possibility of regurgitation and aspiration. Sources: personal experience with my flock (~200 birds to date) plus research into the anatomy of chickens.

Aren't you cutting oxygen supply by rolling them on their backs!? That's where the lungs are located. So they are basically passing out.

It is more of a "freeze" reaction; it's not suffocation. It's a gentle way of inducing 'tonic immobility', a state of temporary paralysis that enables an animal to feign death when cornered by a predator. 

How do you wake the chicken back up?

You say "When I count to 3 and snap my fingers, you'll wake up and not remember a thing. You will be nicer and not mean. You will obey my every command." (Okay, the last part is stretching it a bit). haha Also, you can do it by laying a chicken on its side and draw a line in front of its beak. The chicken has to be looking at it as you mark a line with a stick or your finger in the dirt. The chickens eyes can see 360 degrees and it sees it and it'll get confused and will stay until you pick up the chicken or wipe the line away. That's what they said on "Outrageous Acts of Science".

Brandie, Momma said this is info every chicken owner needs to know.