There were chickens in Oahu. There were chickens on the beaches. There were chickens in the parking lots.
But, when we got to Kauai, there were chickens everywhere. We were woken up every morning by roosters under our window.
We were still on East Coast time, so we were kinda awake already anyway. But roosters are loud. Especially right under your window.
The timeshare we were staying had two bedrooms, so we tried the other one and it was a little better.
The original Polynesians who settled the islands brought chickens with them, so there have been chickens on these islands for a long time. Their chickens were moa, domesticated red junglefowl. Then Europeans came, bringing their fat chickens that lay eggs every day. The chickens all over Kauai are both. We were told that there used to be only the wild chickens, until a couple of hurricanes blew over the coops of some chicken farms. The annual Audubon Society bird count supports that idea. Following Hurricane Iwa in 1982 and Hurricane Iniki in 1992, the number of feral (wild) chickens really increased.
They are researching the DNA of Kauai chickens.
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