The Cochin Craze - Beautiful Birds - Dark History. A story of war, fraud, tea, silver and opium

Cochin-Pekin a beautiful breed with a dark and tragic history. At the height of the Cochin Craze in 1853, one bird in England sold for today's equivalent of £188,000 - $260,481. In the US a similar contagion 'Hen Fever' also known as 'The Fancy' swept the country. Enthusiasts and commercial breeders alike, on both sides of the Atlantic, waited eagerly at the docks as the fast clippers came in with a new cargo of Cochins. In the early days, before the prices began to rise, getting stock out of China was not that simple, the birds were subjected to the rigours of the voyage, which included typhoons, pirate attacks and being neglected and cooped up on shipboard for months. They also risked being cooked and eaten by the crew who had no interests in the profits to be made at the ports and viewed the Cochins purely as a potential dinner. All this danger probably made the Cochin the magnificent creature it is today! For the detailed written version : https://holistic-hen.blogspot.com/2018/02/the-cochin-craze-story-of-addiction.html#.WyQ54hqYOkB
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