Are Chickens The New Must-Have Celebrity Pet?

Since we’re living in an age with Fiona the Hippo, the bar for animals that get us excited is pretty high. Despite this, one unexpected animal-related trend has recently managed to get our attention: celebrities keeping chickens as pets. Chickens!

As far as outrageous and exotic celebrity pets go, chickens are pretty tame. They’re small, not usually dangerous, and they can even be practical, if you can get them to lay eggs. Still, the sheer number of celebs that now own chickens has piqued our interest. Let’s explore.

Most recently, in a photo posted to Instagram yesterday, actress Jennifer Garner came out as a chicken owner and lover. The image shows her walking down a neighborhood street leading an tawny chicken on a leash. In the photo she is looking down at her feathered companion with an adoring smile on her face.

Accompanying the picture, she wrote, "If there isn't a Chicken Lady Day, there really should be. Man, my life gets more exciting all the time. Meet one of our ladies, Regina George. Regina loves long walks, dehydrated bugs, and kale. Regina hates....carbs. #shesanicechickenbutaMeanGirl #MeanGirlsthemovie #ithinkshehasaburnbook #cluckcluck" While it's hard to see how owning a pet chicken makes your life "exciting" — it's not like it's a venomous snake or a baby hippo with elegant neck rolls — the creature's clever name and the fact that she likes to take evening jaunts on a leash makes the chicken-lady-life sound good.

Plenty of other stars own chickens, especially those who live on farms or sprawling Los Angeles estates, however what strikes us about Jennifer Garner's situation is that she seems to treat her chicken with a level of affection humans usually reserve for dogs, cats, or even horses. She's not the only one, though.

Nichole Richie, for instance, has taken glamour photos with her chicken. In April, she posted what looked an awful lot like a baby's birth announcement when her new chicks were born. She wrote, "Meet Ivy, Sibby, & Dixie Chick. They are 4 days old and all fit together in the palm of my hand. They don't do much right now but sleep, urinate on me, and try to attack me... So it kind of feels like my marriage. I'm obsessed! #springtime #chikibaby #nikkifresh"

Among all the famous chicken owners, the one who is most open about her love for the birds has to be Kylie Jenner. Keeping Up With The Kardashian fans will certainly remember that episode when Kris Jenner brought a pig home for her youngest daughter but Kylie mistook it for a chicken. Shortly after that, she clarified that she just assumed it was a chicken because she and her mother had had "over ten conversations" about getting chickens. Since that snafu, Kylie actually has purchased a pet chicken. His name is Eddie, and according to our research, the fancy fellow belongs to a specific breed called Silkie. Kylie loves this Eddie so much, she kissed his furry head in a video on her Snapchat story.

All the evidence leads us to believe that chickens are actually quite sweet, and we may have to reconsider our assumption that they make boring pets. And, now we're placing bets on which celebrity will be the next to go public about his or her love for the unconventional animal.