User:Openskies789/Chicken lineage

The chicken has 4 subspecies in which originate from southern China, India, Southeast Asia and Thailand. Earliest chicken remains have been found at Bon Non Wat which is in Thailand and has been inhabited since the Neolithic Age.

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Lineage

Domestic chickens are related to the Junglefowl of south-east Asia. Junglefowl are a relative of the pheasant which in southeast Asia or southern China domesticated around 7500 BC. Earliest chicken remains have come from Ban Non Wat, in Central Thailand. Here farming settlements have been recorded since the Neolithic Age (up to 1700 BC). The remains of chickens found at Bon Non Wat are a bit earlier from the Bronze age, approx. 1650 to 1250 BC. Ban Non Wat is a dry rice farming site from Neolithic times. This is important to note that other farming which support flooded paddy fields do not show many chickens remains and instead waterfowl hunting. The reason suggested is that the habitat and environment of a wet paddy field does not mimic the natural habitat of the Red Junglefowls. Dry rice fields allowed for secondary vegetation thickets are closer to RJF original environment.

Charles Darwin even thought he could trace the lineage of the domestic chicken by comparing which of the Junglefowls look most similar. Strikingly Darwin was able to name the Red Junglefowl of south-east Asia as the predecessor with domestication occurring elsewhere. He suggested it may of been in India.

In a genomic study in 2020, researchers found that the modern chicken's chief ancestor is a subspecies of red jungle fowl named Gallus gallus spadiceus. This subspecies is located in an area in south-western China. This is the area the pheasant was domesticated after 7500 BC.