Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff production of iHeart Radio. Hey brain Stuff.
Speaker 1: Lauren bog obamb Here. Miss Lucille was a sweet pullet,
Speaker 1: which is a term for a young hen who had
Speaker 1: found a cozy home in a backyard chicken coop in
Speaker 1: Powder Springs, Georgia. Initially, things appeared to be status quo
Speaker 1: with the young exchequer leg horn cross. After observing her
Speaker 1: for a time, however, her owner, who wished to remain anonymous,
Speaker 1: noticed Miss Lucille was growing a comb. Although both sexes
Speaker 1: of the breed can have them. Her owner's instincts told
Speaker 1: her that perhaps something wasn't quite standard, so she sought
Speaker 1: the help of a local farmer. The owner recalls the
Speaker 1: farmer did all the checks to confirm Miss Lucille was
Speaker 1: a miss. She had no saddle feathers, which are pointy
Speaker 1: feathers at the base of the tail, no aggression, didn't
Speaker 1: jump or react in the presence of other hens or roosters,
Speaker 1: and when she was laid back in the farmer's hand,
Speaker 1: she stuck her legs straight out and just laid there.
Speaker 1: All our old timers tricks to identifying roosters, since there's
Speaker 1: no definitive way to tell until they mount another chicken
Speaker 1: or crow aside from lab testing, so Miss Lucille had
Speaker 1: failed the rooster test. However, later on the owner arrived
Speaker 1: home to a mess of feathers in the backyard, an
Speaker 1: unusual event because hens don't usually molt until around eighteen
Speaker 1: months of age. The owner said she began acting more temperamental,
Speaker 1: but I attributed that to her molting, as it can
Speaker 1: be quite uncomfortable for chickens. I was worried about her health.
Speaker 1: Although strange things were certainly a foot in Miss Lucille's world,
Speaker 1: none of them were health threatening. When her feathers grew back,
Speaker 1: they were saddle feathers like those found on roosters. Her
Speaker 1: hackles and tail feathers had also undergone some major changes.
Speaker 1: Her owner said she went from being your typical hen
Speaker 1: to a rooster with beautiful long tail feathers and pointy hackles.
Speaker 1: Her gait changed, and she was definitely at the top
Speaker 1: of the pecking order. Further consultation advised a weight and
Speaker 1: see approach. One farmer told the owner just because she
Speaker 1: now looked like a rooster didn't mean she was one.
Speaker 1: I needed to wait until she crowed or mounted one
Speaker 1: of the hens. Miss Lucille's comb continued growing, but she
Speaker 1: also became more mellow and friendly. Her owner said for
Speaker 1: every indicator that she might still be as she, there
Speaker 1: was another for her being a he. Finally, irrefutable proof
Speaker 1: came at around five months of age. The rooster literally crowed.
Speaker 1: Her owner said. Every day the crow grew louder and stronger.
Speaker 1: It was official that Miss Lucille was now Mr Lucille,
Speaker 1: and to his credit, he assumed the role wonderfully. If
Speaker 1: the girls were low on water, he'd crow, would let
Speaker 1: me know to get it on. He'd lead the charge
Speaker 1: up to roost at night. He'd wake us up with
Speaker 1: his song early each morning. So how does a hen
Speaker 1: become a rooster? Spontaneous sex reversal, such as in the
Speaker 1: case of Mr Lucille, is extremely rare. A study out
Speaker 1: of Bangladesh found that only twenty eight of three thousand
Speaker 1: hens monitored underwent reversal. The jury is still out on
Speaker 1: exactly why this phenomenon occurs, but there are some prevailing theories.
Speaker 1: According to Drew Benson, Assistant professor of poultry science at
Speaker 1: the University of Georgia. Benson said via email, current evidence
Speaker 1: shows that sexual differentiation in birds is a mix of
Speaker 1: direct genetic and hormonal mechanisms. The right ovary and overduct
Speaker 1: regress during embryonic development, leaving the hand with only one
Speaker 1: functional ovary, the left one. Should the left ovary be
Speaker 1: removed or become dysfunctional due to disease, the regressed right
Speaker 1: ovary may form an ovotestis, he explained, but let's break
Speaker 1: that down a little. Most instances of spontaneous sex reversal
Speaker 1: in birds, such as Mr. Lucile's, are believed to be
Speaker 1: connected to alterations in sex steroid hormone action, such as estrogen.
Speaker 1: The hypothesis is that estrogen activity suppresses development of the
Speaker 1: right gonad, but when the ovary fails to secrete estrogen,
Speaker 1: the tissue in the undeveloped right gonad is then changed
Speaker 1: to an ovotestis, which is a testis like structure that
Speaker 1: will again to secrete androgens and give the female bird
Speaker 1: more physical characteristics usually seen in males. Benson noted that
Speaker 1: the lack of estrogen will change the bird's plumage, and
Speaker 1: the increased testosterone causes the crowing and growth of head
Speaker 1: ornaments like the wattle and comb. Scientists aren't sure why
Speaker 1: this happens. Benson said that it's pretty common for ovarian
Speaker 1: disease to cause dysfunction of the ovaries, yet spontaneous sex
Speaker 1: reversal is much less common. He said, you couldn't simply
Speaker 1: remove an ovary from a hen and generate a spontaneous
Speaker 1: sex reversal. The exact mechanism underlying Avian sex determination has
Speaker 1: yet to be resolved. So what's a hen turned roosters
Speaker 1: owner to do? Benson said, embrace the fact that you
Speaker 1: have a rare chicken. The newly changed chicken is no
Speaker 1: longer going to produce eggs, so you would need to
Speaker 1: get a new hen if you wanted egg production. Our
Speaker 1: anonymous owner wound up having to farm Mr Lucile out
Speaker 1: to another rooster lover once the crowing got out of control.
Speaker 1: She said, we have a subdivision behind our house, and
Speaker 1: although we are fortunate enough to be able to have
Speaker 1: roosters on our property, we didn't feel it was the
Speaker 1: neighborly thing to do. While I miss him, I don't
Speaker 1: miss the early morning wake up call, and I'm happy
Speaker 1: he's where he can do his thing freely. Today's episode
Speaker 1: was written by Alia Hoyt. And produced by Tyler Clang.
Speaker 1: Brain Stuff is a production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works.
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