In our country’s not-too-remote history it was very a common practice to own a small flock of chickens for the family’s use. From this heritage comes a multitude of chicken idioms that were (and in some places still are) common in everyday speech.

For instance, chicken idioms are commonly used to describe people. You may hear of someone being called a “good egg” but if you have ever caught a whiff of an egg gone bad, you would never want to be called a ”rotten egg”. Then there are those who are “thin shelled” and can’t take any bumps in life at all without getting “cracked”. There are also “hard shelled” people who won’t let others see what they’re really like. Those individuals are hard to “candle” in order to see what is “developing” inside of them. Someone who is “hard-boiled” is an especially hard case.

A “momma hen” may guard her chicks with surprising fierceness and will get her “hackles raised” if you threaten her young. When the little ones are cold or frightened, this “old mother hen” will “take them under her wing” and comfort them until you “can’t hear a peep out of them”.

Now a “spring chicken” is a young tender thing, but a “tough old bird” has been around for a while. In the same way, a young cockerel may “be a chicken” and get “hen pecked”, but later may “rule the roost” and “have something to crow about”.

Emotions find their expressions in the barnyard as well. When someone is not feeling well he may “feel lousy” or “off his perch”. Another may suffer from being “cooped up”, but that’s what you can expect from a “yard bird”. It “cracks me up” to hear the “cackling laughter” of others enjoying a practical joke, but when the joke turns on them, they may get “madder than a wet hen”. When times are especially tough, don’t “lose your head” and panic. Jumping about in every direction without a plan is as if you are “running around like a chicken with your head cut off.”

Instead, when it is time to gather up all that is precious, “don’t put all your eggs in one basket” in case a tragedy strikes. Yet, putting a little “nest egg” by will encourage other treasures to follow. If these eggs are tended carefully, you’ll be able to “see what hatches out”. But whatever you do, “don’t count your chickens before they hatch” and misjudge the result of your efforts.

Well, what can you do with all of these chicken idioms? Pass them on. But listen for others, as these are just “chicken feed”.