Why is it that chickens are able to run around for a few minutes even though their head has just been severed?

Answer 1

"...Apparently what technically kills the victim isn't the beheading. It's the lack of oxygen and other chemicals in the bloodstream..."

Answer 2

It's mainly electrical impulses surging through the body. Humans seizure and sometimes sit up when they die. Same idea, different situation.

With that said, there's a true story of a chicken who lived for several months after a beheading. Part of the brain was still intact and it would run around, though blindly. Its owners would feed it by dribbling food into the hole left. It finally died when someone, who was baby sitting, let the skin grow over the hole and the poor thing suffocated/starved.

Answer 3

Do u do this on a regular basis or is this a scientific experiment ?
They are not alive if their brain is severed from the body,, ..Its the residual blood being pumped by the heart,

Which is why at the live butcher the slit the throat then throw theminto like a huge cotton candy blender which drains the bllod by centrifugal force an defeathers them at the same time producing a nice bead bird to chop up for soups or fryers the meat is much tenderer

Answer 4

I think a few minutes us an exaggeration. It's to do with electric impulses in the muscles, they just keep on ticking without a brain, like when you whip the batteries out of something but it takes a while to actually run down. Humans can do it too when they're decapitated, don't you know, but not for as long - I admit I don't know how chickens manage it for so long!

Chalice

Answer 5

Hi there. It usually doesn't occur and when it does it is just nerves firing off until it's ATP is depleted which is 30 seconds or less. Have a great day every day.

Answer 6

Because they still are living and even if they can't think, they'll spare their last seconds of life