'mon the roosters

[UncleEbenezer]

Karma there.

I'm reminded of Causley's Jolly Hunter, and even Schubert's Trout.

[Nimrod103]

Probably tried to hide it down his trousers.

[GrahamPlatt]

A colleague of mine once worked in an animal lab. He was just prepping a buck rabbit for injection, the technique being to hold the animal tightly to your chest, head away from you. Unfortunately his grip was not firm enough & the rabbit managed to get enough room to get its back legs into action... severely gouging the front of his chest. Necessitated a trip to casualty, where he got surprisingly little sympathy from the nurses!

[Rhyd6]

In her gap year my daughter worked in a vets, one day a lady with an extremely large tom cat walked into the surgery and informed the vet that no matter how she tried she couldn't get the cat to take the pills he'd prescribed. The vet, with a slightly superior smile said "no problem, there's a knack to this, just watch how I do it". He removed the cat from it's basket tucked it under his arm, grasped its jaw firmly to open it and the cat exploded. The cat ended up on top of the medicine cupboard, the vets glasses were hanging off one ear, he was bleeding profusely from numerous scratches to his arms and face and my daughter was howling with laughter, especially when the woman announced "that's exactly how my husband ended up when he tried that".
As we'd always had cats my daughter said "why don't you do what mum does, crush the tablet up and mix it in pate, our cats always gobble it up".
Although an extremely nasty thing to have happened I'm afraid I'm on the side of the rooster.

R6

[XFool]

Ive often picked up a cat only for it to go berserk in my arms - and they're only armed with small claws.

That's your first mistake, cats do not like being picked up. Particularly if their feet are off the ground - so if you pick one up always ensure all its paws are firmly placed on your body. Some people try to hold a cat on its back, like a baby. It's not a baby, it's a cat!

[XFool]

In her gap year my daughter worked in a vets, one day a lady with an extremely large tom cat walked into the surgery and informed the vet that no matter how she tried she couldn't get the cat to take the pills he'd prescribed. The vet, with a slightly superior smile said "no problem, there's a knack to this, just watch how I do it". He removed the cat from it's basket tucked it under his arm, grasped its jaw firmly to open it and the cat exploded.

There is a trick, that's not quite it! (If they won't accept it in milk) Admittedly a bit too time consuming for a vet but, if you can encourage the cat onto an old blanket or towel, then when they are settled, quickly wrap them up tightly in the towel, like a baby in swaddling clothes. Hold them in your arms, then you can open their mouth by using your fingers to gently squeezing each corner of their mouth with your hand around the back of the head.

They really don't like it! But there isn't much they can do about it and it gets the job done.

[Leothebear]

Can't blame the bird. It was cockfighting of a sort.

[stewamax]

As an aside, Indian cockfighting may be different from how it was managed in England, but it wasn't just a matter of putting two birds in combat. Suitably bred ones were carefully trained and prepared like racehorses by a man called a feeder. When entering the ring, the feeder handed over to a setter who was the equivalent of a jockey. The more successful feeders and setters were relatively well off - like successful trainers and jockeys today, and were patronised by those with money - again like today. Substantial sums were wagered on individual fights of a series of fights called a 'main'.
The setters must have needed nerves of steel as a hyped-up bird with sharp spurs could inflict serious injury.