<snip>
SOMERSET, Pa. --Henrietta the chicken was living inconspicuously among 36,000 other birds at Brendle Farms for 18 months -- until a foreman noticed she had four legs.
"It's as healthy as the rest," the farm's owner, Mark Brendle, told The Daily American.
Brendle's 13-year-old daughter, Ashley, named the chicken Henrietta after the discovery Thursday. The bird has two normal front legs and, behind those, two more feet. They are of a similar size to her front legs but don't function. The chicken drags her extra feet behind her.
In 30 years of farming, Brendle said, he's never before seen a chicken with four legs.
There's no definitive reason why such deformities happen, said Cliff Thompson, a retired professor of genetics at the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown. He said it could be an accident of development, akin to a sixth toe on a cat.
Brendle said he jokingly suggested to his family that it sell Henrietta in an Internet auction, but Ashley objected.
http://www.boston.com/news/odd/articles/2006/09/23/pa_farm_discovers_a_4_legged_chicken?mode=PF