What is it with Colorado’s local municipalities and chickens?
The Littleton City Council is considering “rules for urban chicken enthusiasts” after a neighbor’s complaint led to an investigation by the city.
Last month, the Greeley City Council voted nay on a backyard chicken ordinance. The Greeley Tribune reported on the decision in one of the more entertaining news stories we’ve read in a long time:
A relaxed backyard chicken ordinance got a split vote from the Greeley City Council Tuesday night, sending the proposal to the chopping block.
The decision surprised chicken supporters, who greatly outnumbered opponents in council chambers.
Of 19 who people spoke during a public hearing on the issue – which would have allowed up to six backyard hens so long as cleanliness, predator-proofing and distance-from-neighbors conditions were met – 13 favored the change. Additionally, about 15 people stood when Dixie Hart asked to see those who didn’t want to take the podium but supported chickens. [Pols emphasis]
In Longmont, “the great chicken debate” of 2009 led to the formation of something called the Longmont Urban Hen Coalition. In July 2008, The Colorado Springs Gazette was applauding a law allowing residents to own chickens and encouraging the city to overturn a ban on goats, pigs and roosters.
With so much apparent chicken hand-wringing going on, we thought we’d leave it to Colorado Pols readers to set some sort of local policy standard. So vote below.
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ran a chicken farm in her urban back patio in Mazatlan. Her suppliers would bring in about 50 or so chicks periodically, which she would then raise, kill, pluck, clean, and sell to folks who generally lived fairly nearby.
While many of our zoning regulations improve public health and the quality of life, I think we’ve over compartmentalized our world. I have no opinion on the Great Chicken Debate, but I do know that there’s something vibrant and wonderful about shops and homes being side-by-side, about fresh chicken being sold a short walk from your home, about neighborhoods and communities that are alive and slightly chaotic. I think we could afford to recover a little bit of that.
Raising chickens is very educational for children, and a lot of adults who only know about what is mass produced in plastic bags.
You do not need a rooster, not popular in many locations, but you can get an impregnated hen which will produce fertile eggs. That is a great education too.
Learning the correct feed mix is essential to tasty eggs and later on, what I grew up with, Sunday dinner.
Chickens are fine for urban life. With proper care.
Aurora should have chickens, however, our chicken fearing city council has already expressed their concerns that something good like chickens are too radical for them. Also, anything that might hint there is fun in Aurora (
seeremember coffee shop bikini sign).I guess someone should run for Aurora City Council on the platform of a chicken in every yard and pots on every farm.
MY Grandma told me why Denver ran live chickens out of town years ago. (as I wanted to build a coop I think I was 6) It was not for the eggs, cleanliness of the coops, hens or anything to do with grocery stores… but it was because of the roosters nasty habit of crowing at the break of dawn, everyday. Without consideration of weekends. This was intolerable to the Jazz-minded, graveyard shift, sleepers in… that had such a strong anti-chicken agenda.
I’m pretty sure it violates zoning, but none of us has turned him in. I think it is kind of cool.
We trade for dog daycare. They currently have a bobcat that has been lurking so I’m not sure how much longer I’m going to be enjoying fresh eggs.
having a client who was laying hens, or a hen who was laying clients. 🙂
I need to apply for the permits, which are expensive in Denver, but I pretty sure zoning allows it. I have to do the permits (though the expense tempted me to go underground) because I have at least one scold for a neighbor who, although not directly adjoining my property, can probably still hear the sounds of clucking hens and probably would file a complaint.
The fines if you don’t and somebody turns you in are quite punitive.
but it involved beekeeping, and IIRC the beekeepers lost out. I am all for it this type of stuff though – do we really have to homogenize and sterilize our neighborhoods to such a point ? There has to be some sort of sensible middle ground where people can raise chickens as they wish without inconveniencing others.
Not so sure what to do about the roosters though. I could see how that would be a real problem.
It will be fresher and have greater nutritional value. Much less energy will be utilized getting it from neighbor to neighbor than large trucks congesting the intersates. One can not overlook the importance of kids AND adults getting a feel for food production. Same goes for hunting.
For the life of me I can’t see why anyone would mind a rooster crowing at dawn. Get up. Enjoy the day. But I’m an old country boy and that sound always makes me smile.
and I hated it. 🙂
that I did not find charming
Oh, I’m sorry. 🙂
I have a lot of farmer in my history, and roosters are not part of what I want to hear in the morning or anytime.
In Mexico, our chicken, our beef, our produce, all tasted far better than what we get here (and that’s not just sentimentality; it’s a fact!). And, yes, waking up before dawn to the rooster’s crowing isn’t so bad (I’ve done it in many times and places, including those when it meant getting up in the dark and going out to the fields. Maybe not having grown up with it made it more delightful when it did become a part of my life for various stretches of time).
Of course, I’ve always like the pre-dawn hours, when the world is quiet and mystical, and the spirits of the mind are awake and eager to play.
My grandma had laying hens–she sold eggs for a living–and I wanted to wring her stupid roosters’ necks. They started crowing at 4:00 a.m. I have no idea how people sleep through it.
The GOOD news here is that you don’t need roosters for hens to lay eggs so problem solved.
and I’m ordering my chicks from a place that can tell the difference between males and females; although if they make a mistake and one becomes a cockerel (which means less than one year old, that being the magic age that they become roosters) then I’m going to have a nice fryer this summer.
There are a bunch of blogs and online groups trying to rally the pro-chicken and pro-urban farm forces out there. Here’s a good one:
Denver Backyard Farms
I mean, how hard can it be? C’mon, American farmers!
If we could only have blessed silence, we would truly have “two chickens in every pot”: our OWN chickens!
Plus we need goats. Great lawnmowers and garbage disposals.
Hens good idea to allow in res. neighborhoods. Fresh eggs, local growers, lots of positives here. But, Roosters at 5am in the morning sounds like a bad idea in populated areas. I agree with the “live and let live” attitude. Let people do what they want to do including having hens that lay eggs, unless it starts directly negetively effecting others. Roosters fit into this later category I think.