A recent Reuters news story reported from Beijing that hundreds of chickens have been found dead in a small village in east China . The reason was the screaming of a four-year old boy that had been scared by a barking dog. A witness said that the little boy bent over the henhouse window, screaming for a long time, after being frightened from the dog.

A court has officially ruled that the cause of death was the screaming of the boy, since it was "the only unexpected abnormal sound" and that 443 chickens trampled each other to death in fear.

Also, the father of the killer-boy was ordered to pay 1,800 yuan (164 JD) in compensation to the owner of the chickens.

For further reading, I advice you to take a look at a valuable scientific article of Mr. Graham B. Scott (of the Scottish Agricultural College) entitled "Effects of short-term whole body vibration on animals with particular reference to poultry".

Labels: Fun, What's on the web