Can chickens live with their head chopped off?

Question

Can chickens live with their head chopped off?

Answer 1

Actually in some cases YES!

Mike was a rooster that lived in the 1940's, and he lived even after his head was chopped off...for 18 more months!  

     Farmer Olsen was planning on making fried chicken for his mother-in-law, and her favorite part was the neck.  When he went to slaughter the chicken, he tried to leave as much of the neck in tact as he could.  After he chopped off the head, the chicken got up and started resuming normal chicken behavior with the other animals, even though its head was totally missing!  Olsen figured it might be an interesting curiosity, and after the chicken was still alive and well after a week, he took it into the local university to have scientists study Mike.

     Scientists determined that he survived because the ax had missed his jugular vein, and a clot had prevented him from bleeding to death.  They also discovered that Mike had enough brain stem left to carry on his normal rooster functions.  Olsen had to feed him with an eyedropper, carefully dropping food into his exposed esophagus.  Mike became quite famous, and lived for one and a half years with no head.