By LUKE VOOGT
FOR half a decade, Ocean Grove’s top modelling talent has flown under the radar. Until now.
Flapper the chicken was recently spotted by locals during her favourite pastime: travelling to locations around Ocean Grove to strike a pose.
Her “mum” Elaine Janes, said people often mistake her photogenic chook for a runaway.
“They are not used to seeing a chook out at the park or the playground by herself,” she said.
Ironically, Flapper was a runaway, before beginning her modelling career.
Flapper was one of two chickens Elaine spotted walking across the road near her home in 2011.
“I scooped them up one under each arm and took them home,” she said.
Elaine spent the next few months placing advertisements, door knocking and searching for the owners.
She had six calls, but said the response was always the same.
“They would say ‘they’re not my chooks, but I’ll have them’,” she said.
She welcomed Flapper into her home and so began the glamorous hen’s photo shoots around Geelong and the Bellarine.
“She knows she’s out for a purpose – to get photographed,” Elaine said.
“She’s such a poser.”
Flapper has her own transport fleet: a cart, a pusher and a trolley. As well as being photographed, she enjoys social outings, grapes and ice cream.
Elaine has two younger chickens, which she’s trained to do party tricks for grapes. She said she loves all of her feathered family.
“People think chooks are dumb,” she said.
“But they are very clever and well behaved.”
Elaine is also champion weightlifter. She’s competing in the Australian Masters Weightlifting Championship in Hobart this June, where she’ll attempt the clean and jerk record, for the 70-74 age group.
She’s sending her chooks off to a house in Leopold while she’s away, which is “boot camp” compared to her place.
“They are spoilt,” she said.
“I have no family – perhaps that’s why I treat them like family.”
The weightlifting champion said keeping her chooks happy has benefits.
“People would kill for my chooks’ eggs,” she said.
