oddly enough

oddly enough

1,200 California chickens to retire on the East Coast

SACRAMENTO, Calif.

Their egg-laying days behind them, some 1,200 Northern California chickens are heading for a cozy retirement on the East Coast, where they will live outside of cages and have plenty of room to spread their wings.

The Sacramento Bee reports that an anonymous $50,000 donation is funding Operation Chicken Airlift, which was to send the hens on a cross-country cargo flight to upstate New York on Wednesday.

From there the white Leghorn chickens will be ferried to various sanctuaries.

Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary in New York, where 200 of the birds will end up, is providing perches, grass and even a wooded area where they can roam.

Laying hens generally are too lean for human consumption and usually are slaughtered after they stop providing eggs.

Red ‘honey’ in Utah may come from candy-fed bees

SALT LAKE CITY

What appears to be red honey is showing up in some Utah beehives, and state officials say it may be coming from bugs feasting on candy-cane byproduct.

Utah Department of Agriculture and Food officials say they’ve received several complaints about the odd-colored goo in hives in Davis, Salt Lake and Utah counties.

They say the bees apparently were fed the byproduct that came from a candy factory.

Officials say they don’t have any reason to call the red substance unsafe, but they advise beekeepers not to mix it with normal-colored honey and to report it to the state.

Regulators are investigating whether the substance can be considered honey.

Beehive State standards define honey as a product that originates from a floral source.

16 human skulls found on streets in Prague

PRAGUE

Police in Prague say 15 human skulls have been found in a wooden box found on a street, and another was found in a garbage bin.

Spokeswoman Jana Roesslerova says police found the 15 skulls Thursday morning near a garbage container after they were alerted by a telephone caller.

Roesslerova says each skull was numbered.

She says another skull, also bearing a number, was found in a garbage bin Wednesday by a homeless person.

Police say it is not clear whether the two cases are connected.

They have asked experts to help in their investigation.

Associated Press