They already call them college hens. The disclosure this week through social networks of photos of a group of roosters and hens roaming freely in the University of La Laguna (ULL) has returned to the present a situation that comes from far behind. And it not only affects the surroundings of the Guajara campus of the ULL, but also other points in La Laguna and Tenerife. It is concentrated in the metropolitan area and the North, but there are also dispersed groups and of their own free will throughout the insular geography.
Behind something that seems so anecdotal hides a problem. The pests of specimens of this bird cause road safety problemsby invading roads on the Island, of citizen coexistence, especially due to noise, and of public health, as there are neighbors who give them food scraps without being aware that with this they attract other pests, mainly cats and rats.
Areas swallowed up by the city
José Luis Hernández, Councilor for the Environment and Animal Welfare of La Laguna, knows the matter very well. The City Council has been dealing with groups of feral roosters and hens for years. “The problem is concentrated in rural areas that have been swallowed up by urban populations,” he says. The points with these plagues in the municipality of La Laguna are La Verdellada -and other nuclei around the Vía de Ronda-, Geneto, the surroundings of the University Hospital of Canary Islands (HUC) and Los Baldios.
Where did college roosters and hens come from? It is not very well known, but what usually happens is that they run away from farms, someone releases them or they come from groups of nuclei that are close or not so close. This week the Guajara campus environment joined. The ULL requested support from the Laguna Department of Animal Welfare. A group of students involved with animal welfare, however, found a solution. The University recounted it on Friday on Twitter: «This week some roosters decided to take a walk through the ULL facilities. Thanks to the students, they are in a better place, a farm run by a veterinary assistant where they can live in perfect conditions and as they deserve. The tweet adds: «Thanks to Alejandro, Paula, Ariel, Nerea, Elsa, Yolanda, Mónica, Andrea, Nereida, Mauro, Ainhoa, Sergio, Andrés, Ayose, Yulissa and Tania. What good people the ULL has! And, of course, thanks to our university community.
They not only run from here to there in the gardens and even in some classrooms in Guajara. They get to get into the Vía de Ronda, to climb the benches and walls of La Verdellada and even enter a hallway. A resident of La Laguna, fed up with the kikiriki from very early on, recently took the initiative and cut down the branches of the trees in a green area near his house to prevent them from perching there and try to get them to leave. Others limit themselves to calling the City Hall of La Laguna to complain about the inconvenience.
Hernández assures that municipalities such as La Laguna resort to companies specialized in pests. The one who works for the Aguere Town Hall is Fumigadora Internacional. The specimens are removed and taken to farms that offer to host them. Something similar to what the ULL students did. But there is another obstacle, which the Laguna councilor admits: “In some actions, support from the Local Police has been required because some neighbors were opposed to the removal of the roosters and hens.”
It is not only road and citizen safety and public health. María Luisa Fernández, president of the College of Veterinarians of Tenerife, warns of the risks of consuming the eggs of these hens. “There are people who consume and even sell these eggs. It should not be done. They come from hens that have not gone through any control and these eggs can cause serious health problems such as salmonellosis, which can be fatal. In addition, according to the veterinarian, these birds have a great capacity to move and reproduce, and a lot of resistance. They feed on plants and invertebrates. Its necessary control is complicated.
The lights of Santa Cruz
In Santa Cruz de Tenerife some outbreaks have been detected. The Department of Public Services and Animal Welfare, directed by Carlos Tarife, places them in Somosierra, Camino de El Hierro, anaza Y valleseco. It is also common to see them in the North, for example in various areas of the municipality of La Orotava. They usually appear in the landscaped areas of the roundabout accessing the municipality from the TF-5 through El Ramal, in the Lercaro urbanization and next to the La Mano Amiga monument and the Entre Pueblos square, in the access from the TF-5 to the San Jerónimo industrial estate, exit 35.
However, in the case of La Orotava there have been no neighborhood complaints, perhaps because they are areas without too many nearby houses. The mayor, Francisco Linares, emphasizes that the City Council “has never received complaints.” “Here we are used to always,” he qualifies.
In the urbanization of La Quinta, in the lower area of Santa Úrsula, the residents have complained about the presence of roosters and hens running free in the streets and green areas, especially because the food they receive, and their egg laying, serve also to increase the population of rats and mice. Given the repeated demands of the neighbors and to try to control these populations, the Santaursulero City Council installed in November 2021 several signs on public roads that recall that the Ordinance on the Ownership of Companion Animals “prohibits the feeding of animals that They can become pests, packs or catteries, avoiding uncontrolled reproduction and health problems that may arise. The one who complies will have his sanction.
The La Quinta de Chimaque Neighborhood Association insistently demands that “animals, mainly chickens, should not continue to be fed with all kinds of waste and food that end up rotting and attracting other animals such as cats and rats.” “Even so, there are a number of uncivils who continue to throw food at it,” he points out. This group has asked the Consistory to move these roosters and hens to another place where they do not pose a problem. The president of the association, Jorge Pérez, regrets that despite the fact that the number of copies has dropped in recent times, “they still roam freely and the Local Police have identified several people who continue to feed them.”
