Green’s Dictionary of Slang

chook n.

[SE chicken]
(usu. Aus./N.Z.)

1. (also chook-a-loo, chook-chook, chookey-hen, chookie, chucky) a chicken.

[Aus]W. Howitt Land, Labour and Gold 93: They overtook a huge and very fat hen trudging along [...] they tied chucky up in a handkerchief, and rode on.
[Aus]Bulletin (Sydney) 19 June 4/1: Lord Augustus has 100 little ‘chookies’ out now, and has given orders [...] for the separation of the bantams from the brahmapootras.
[Aus]Dead Bird (Sydney) 26 Oct. 2/1: ‘I’ll take all fowl, please’ His plate was heaped up with chookie.
[UK]Morn. Post (Cairns, Qld) 11 Jan. 3/1: [headline] Fowl Plays, or, A Story of a Baker and the Chooks.
[Aus]Bulletin (Sydney) 27 Jan. 14/3: Poultry-raisers have only sparrow-hawks and carpet-snakes to contend with. Occasionally, if a gang of Hindu cane-thrashers are camped handy, a mysterious leak will occur among the chookies.
[Aus]Bulletin (Sydney) 8 Nov. 12/3: A few weeks ago an Auburn (Vic.) dairyman had a row with a neighbor over a hen – a common, no-account chookey hen worth about 2s.
[Aus]Sun. Times (Perth) 12 July 1/1: The poultry epidemic has broken out violently in W.A. [...] every other citizen is either a breeder or a buyer of the chook-a-loo.
[NZ]Eve. Post (Wellington) 30 Apr. 7/5: A Stolen Chook [...] If he had asked for the ‘chook’ [...] his friend would have given it to him.
[Aus]Sun. Times (Perth) 26 June 2nd sect. 12/6: There’s money in hen-fruit. A Belmont poultry farmer is alleged to be clearing £2000 a year from the exertions of the conscientious chook.
[Ire]Joyce Ulysses 54: Afraid of the chickens she is, he said mockingly. Afraid of the chook-chooks. I never saw such a stupid pussens as the pussens.
[Aus]Horsham Times (Vic.) 14 Sept. 7/4: Cows, an’ chooks a feed er two.
[NZ]Eve. Post (Wellington) 1 Nov. 13/2: ‘Cheers for the Chook’ [...] White Leghorn hen Doreen [...] today laid her 357th egg in 365 days.
[Aus]X. Herbert Capricornia (1939) 342: They’ve got four or five hundred quid stowed away at home, in the fowl-house under the broody chooks.
[Aus]R.S. Close Love me Sailor 150: They shuffled back, like chooks scolded with an old woman’s apron.
[Aus](con. 1936–46) K.S. Prichard Winged Seeds (1984) 161: Pat and Pam dispatched their [...] brown bread and bacon and cuts of chookie with hearty appetite.
[Aus]D. Niland Shiralee 117: How about a chook for tea?
[Aus]D. O’Grady A Bottle of Sandwiches 128: The boss ran quite a few chooks on the place, too, and sold the eggs.
[Aus] in K. Gilbert Living Black 130: Things have improved in the lock-up: stew, milk in your tea, the odd chook.
[Aus]A. Weller Day of the Dog 79: I’m hungry. I could do with a big juicy chook and lots of lovely, lovely chips.
[UK]K. Lette Llama Parlour 33: Rondah was laid out on a slab, rotating every twenty minutes, like a chook on a rotisserie.
[Aus]M.B. ‘Chopper’ Read Chopper 4 41: He won the day and kept the offending chook.
[Aus]Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 19 Apr. 🌐 [headline] Pensioner rules roost in chook battle.
[Aus]T. Spicer Good Girl Stripped Bare 253: Our bosses run around like chooks with their heads cut off.

2. a woman.

[Aus]Truth (Sydney) 30 Sept. 1/5: She’ll hold her bloomin’ own / With any chook.
[Aus]Healesville & Yarra Glen Guardian (Vic.) 14 Oct. 4/5: Maria ’ops out on to the [tennis] court with another old chook. Maria takes first bang [...] and the other old chook misses it.
[Aus]H. Drake-Brockman Blister Act I: Don’t mean to say you’ve found some poor chook willing to take you on, Sid?
[Aus]R. Park Poor Man’s Orange 263: ‘We ain’t licked,’ he said [...] ‘No, we ain’t licked yet, old chook.’.
[Aus]D. Niland Shiralee 186: Some half-witted chook’s got off with Mac’s kid.
[Aus]‘Nino Culotta’ Cop This Lot 146: ‘What screamin’ chooks?’ ‘I dunno. Some housewives’ mob or somethin’.’.
[Aus]J. Byrell (con. 1959) Up the Cross 22: She wasn’t such a bad old chook.
[NZ]McGill Dict. of Kiwi Sl. 27/2: chook [...] woman.
[Aus]P. Carey Tax Inspector (1992) 62: She [...] gave a mocking little cursty. ‘You old chook,’ he said.
[NZ]McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. [as cit. 1988].

3. (N.Z.) a fool.

[Aus]D. Niland Call Me When the Cross Turns Over (1958) 102: The silly old chook poured it into his gizzard instead of rubbing it on himself.
[Aus]Sydney Morn. Herald 20 Nov. 15/2: Such phrases as ‘like a silly chook’.
[NZ]McGill Dict. of Kiwi Sl. 27/2: chook [...] silly person.
[NZ]McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. [as cit. 1988].
[Aus]Sydney Morn. Herald 24 Mar. 35/7: Is this a case of a silly old chook [...] having egg on its face?

4. (N.Z. gay) a male prostitute who dressed as a schoolboy to encourage the paedophile trade [play on chicken n. (4d)].

[NZ]W. Ings ‘Trolling the Beat to Working the Soob’ in Int’l Jrnl Lexicog. 23:1 72: [C]hook (an older worker who dressed in school uniform to pass himself off as younger trade),.

5. see bush chook under bush n.1

In compounds

In phrases

may your chooks turn into emus and kick your shithouse down (also …and kick your dunny (door) down)

(Aus.) used to convey one’s extreme annoyance with another’s actions or words.

[Aus]B. Humphries Barry McKenzie [comic strip] in Complete Barry McKenzie (1988) 78: I hope all your chooks turn into emus and kick down your shithouse.
[US]Maledicta IX 93: There are many colorful terms used in Australia that have not yet been collected. Examples: May your chooks [chicken] turn to emus and kick your dunny [outhouse] down!
OnLine Dict. of Playground Sl. 🌐 dunny n. toilet (originally outside but now any): e.g. the classic ‘Aussie curse’, i.e. ‘may your chooks turn into emus and kick your dunny down!’.
[UK]Guardian 10 July 3: May your chooks turn into emus and kick your dunny door down.