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Conflict over city zoning comes home to roost in Jamaica Plain
By adamg on Fri, 03/02/2012 - 8:08am
The Jamaica Plain Gazette reports some home-farming advocates aren't waiting for Boston officials to amend city zoning codes to allow backyard poultry, but that has at least one neighbor of an "illicit chicken-raiser" crying fowl.
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Comments
There's a place for hippies
There's a place for hippies to raise chickens in their backyards, and it's called the Pioneer Valley. You live in the city--deal with it.
There's a place for
There's a place for busy-bodies like you to mind and that's your own property. It's not your backyard -- deal with it.
Fine
Figure out a way for chicken noise and smell to end at your property line and it won't be a problem. Until then, obey the ordinance or the bird's getting a bucket of water to the beak.
There are so many farms worth supporting in Mass. For idiots who have no idea how to raise chickens to build coops in the backyard is not only unnecessary, but borders on idiocy. "I want to know where my food comes from." Get to know your farmer.
Theory or Reality?
Where have you encountered a problem? Have you made repeated calls to authorities over a neighbor?
Or are you just being a hating hater with grand theories about "what everyone knows" and no reality or experience to back it up?
The neighbors of the house I own in a densely populated area of Portland with lots smaller than JP have chickens and there are none of these problems you claim exist every time somebody has chickens.
what a big man you are
Murder your neighbor's animals much or do you just like to talk tough? Will their kids be next?
Such a lovely neighbor you must be!
Up with chickens!
Makes no sense that I can't legally keep a couple of hens in my own backyard. Fresh eggs, much quieter than my neighbour's Retriever (which I can hear barking from inside his house, while I'm inside mine!), and there's no smell as long as you keep their housing clean and don't overcrowd - just like with any other pet (and unlike dogs or cats, chook manure is compostable). Silly and outdated zoning codes.
What about when they become a health or noise problem?
Maybe urban chickens are okay if there are one or two, and if the owners keep them scrupulously clean. But what about when that's not the case? Then we have noise, smell, and chicken waste draining into the sewers (and the Charles). And the little home businesses to sell the eggs--a perfect cover for drug dealing. Just what we need.
True, but you could say the same about dogs or cats
That's why God gave us ISD and BPD.
just sayin'
How would you feel if your neighbor kept hens as well and then decided he'd like a little bacon to go with those eggs... do you think keeping pigs for slaughter in residential neighborhoods in the city is fine as well? What if your neighbor decided he didn't feel like taking care of his hens any longer and decided to slaughter them in his yard for all to see? It's all fine and dandy seeming when you and others view hens as pets that provide eggs, but many many others see hens and other such animals not as cute pets, but as sources of food eggs or otherwise. In a dense city, it's just not appropriate. If you want a mini-farm, move to the 'burbs or a rural area. Just my opinion. Glad you're not my neighbor.
Thanks, Miki!
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Take a look at the zoning code before hyperventilating
There are actually two separate parts of the zoning code dealing with farm-type animals - basically small ones (chickens and rabbits, for example) and large ones (pigs, cows and horses). The city's only looking at amending the section dealing with small animals.
I don't think the pro-chicken crowd is saying they only want to keep chickens as pets - they're pretty open about the whole food thing and it's part of the urban farm movement.
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/avian/
http://www.cdc.gov/flu/avian/gen-info/facts.htm
Rolls Eyes
Oh please. You need millions of people living with birds in their houses to create avian flu issues.
Nice try.
If you are so worried, why don't you look into how pork is produced in this country and, especially, in Mexico - where the last "swine" flu emerged, a processing plant was in close proximity with human worker's dwellings and the company wasn't exactly caring with the waste.
Urban Poultry Workshop
At the Artisan's Asylum on April 13:
http://urbanpoultry101-eorg.eventbrite.com/
As someone who has had (non urban) chickens....
I have found the "hippie" urban chicken people to be very good when it comes to chickenkeeping 101. Keeping the feed secure, keeping clean coops, keeping the chickens warm (most urban chicken owners that I have seen have electric heat for their coops), and overall clean yards make for a happy chicken. That being said, urban chicken keepers really need more than is allowed (4?) in order to save money on eggs or poultry.
I'm all for the backyard chicken movement as long as people know what they are doing.
As for the bird viruses Swirrly, it really only takes one bird to infect other birds. The good news is that bird is going to have to fly from Asia or Northern Africa for the more serious viruses (the non serious ones don't effect humans anyway even if we eat poultry products). We have a better chance of getting bit by a rabid bat in our sleep in Boston.