Is my new neighbor doing something weird, or potentially something criminal with his roosters?

[FunChefChick]

Yes I already notified Animal Control for those wondering, and they came out yesterday. Looking for a sanity check from people with much more expertise than I have.

I live in an unincorporated part of my county, where there are no regulations about the number of or gender of chickens whatsoever. Even though I live on a residential street with single-family homes (zoned R5) it's literally anything goes, chicken-wise, whereas the local cities in my county all have rules prohibiting roosters (only - hens are okay). One neighbor a few doors down has some number of egg-laying hens and a rooster and it's been no problem at all, and charming to hear the rooster crow periodically.

However. I got brand new neighbors next door last month - new renters moved in, I have not met the landowner - and ten days ago they brought home some chickens. Three roosters and one hen. (?) Seemed odd to me, but I'm not familiar with backyard chicken strategy so what do I know? Plus maybe ... they are holding a rooster or two for a friend? Or plan to get a lot more hens? In their ... standard-size back yard ... which had no coop ... where they are renting? Maybe?

Because the roosters have been crowing LIKE MAD for days, I finally peeked through the fence between our backyards to see what the heck they had there - which is when I realized they had multiple roosters and only one hen. They scrambled to start building an enclosure for them on the day they brought the chickens home (9 days ago).

It does appear to me that the roosters are NOT being kept humanely. All 3 of the roosters have been kept tethered to individual plastic lawn chairs, out in the direct sun, with no access to water or feed or shade nearly this whole time. The tether is simply a string tied around the leg; no stretch or give whatsoever. It was above 90 degrees for several days last week and they were out there at least 10 hours of the day in direct sunlight. On Monday after one week of this they replaced the plastic lawn chairs with individual bales of hay and tethered the roosters to those instead. The roosters are tethered away from each other, but within line of sight. I'm not sure where the hen is being kept as she is not typically in sight. I do not know where they are keeping the chickens at night.

So that all seems . . . well, suspicious and not entirely humane, to me. But maybe there are perfectly reasonable explanations for all of that? My plan was to simply ask them, over the fence one day whenever I could see them in the backyard with their kids or the chickens, to see what they say.

Long story still long: I looked over the fence late Thursday because the roosters were being MUCH louder than usual, and saw 1) the kids playing in the back yard in/amongst the roosters and 2) that one of the roosters' tether had gotten wrapped around the lawn chair so that the string was much too short, and he was stuck in place unable to walk. He was literally waving his leg in the air because he couldn't put it down and crowing continually. It was awful. I recorded about 20 seconds of it with my phone, and then I asked one of the children playing if they could unwrap his string as he was stuck.

The child said: "But these roosters are mean" followed by "These are fighting roosters". I backed away and started reviewing the images I'd taken throughout the week, and only then did I realize the lack of water, shade, how much time they'd been tethered, etc. Ugh.

I notified Animal Control immediately the next morning and they opened a case, took my statement, images, and video clips. But they have since said "the birds look healthy, and there's no evidence of fighting. We can't charge them until/unless they've actually fought the birds." They agree it's very weird to have this many roosters and only one hen. (They also wish there was SOME regulations to help them keep chickens safer in this area).

So now my neighbors have been contacted by Animal Control, almost certainly are aware that I'm who reported them, and nothing has been done (that I'm aware of) to prevent them from doing something horrific.

OR. Am I completely wrong here and I've falsely accused innocent people of planning to commit a horrific crime? Argh! I don't want to be that busybody neighbor! Before I was annoyed at the constant all-day crowing and now I'm much more terrified for these safety of these roosters.

Help! Thoughts?

Edited to remove the pic which inadvertently included the child - totally agree that was inappropriate. I meant to show just the 2 roosters tethered. My error, totally.

 

[Wyorp Rock]

OR. Am I completely wrong here and I've falsely accused innocent people of planning to commit a horrific crime? Argh! I don't want to be that busybody neighbor! Before I was annoyed at the constant all-day crowing and now I'm much more terrified for these safety of these roosters.

You asked so - Yes. I think your are wrong - you've convicted/accused/made assumptions about them committing a crime. You got any evidence? Nope - speculation on your part there.

You even called the "authorities" a.k.a. Animal Control to investigate. They deem all is well and no crime committed. Bet those neighbors really enjoyed THAT visit.

You don't want to be "that neighbor" but you sure are coming across that way.

I actually think I see what you may be getting at. You were first annoyed at the crowing. A peek around and you thought ahhh...Animal Control will take care of this problem for me. They didn't. So now you are either venting, just trying to stir up more trouble/build some type of "case" with your own evidence to present back to/go to and argue with Animal Control/County(?) so you can have them revisit. Your wanting to arm yourself with some evidence that Yes indeed these people are planning on committing a horrific crime - see BYC People said so!

Maybe it's not just the roosters that annoy you - could be the kids, the noise these folks are making during coop building, the people themselves, you were enjoying that property being empty....who knows?

Did I get any of it right? I bet I did, I'm actually pretty darn good at this stuff

Here's how to fix it if you are really that concerned. Get some cold bottled water, coffee and a box of doughnuts. Go over there about an hour after they have started work on building. Tell them you've heard them working hard the last week or so, took a peek and wanted to come take a better look at what's going on. You brought goodies for their break. Start a conversation aimed to actually forge a neighborly relationship, you might like it.

Just My 2¢

 

[shawluvsbirds]

I hung a piece of sheet metal off of the side of my duck run to block wind and provide a little shade. I wonder what my neighbors think I'm hiding?

 

[OhZark Biddies]

After they finish their coop, they’ll probably put up some ugly red signs

 

[roosterhavoc]

Yes I already notified Animal Control for those wondering, and they came out yesterday. Looking for a sanity check from people with much more expertise than I have.

I live in an unincorporated part of my county, where there are no regulations about the number of or gender of chickens whatsoever. Even though I live on a residential street with single-family homes (zoned R5) it's literally anything goes, chicken-wise, whereas the local cities in my county all have rules prohibiting roosters (only - hens are okay). One neighbor a few doors down has some number of egg-laying hens and a rooster and it's been no problem at all, and charming to hear the rooster crow periodically.

However. I got brand new neighbors next door last month - new renters moved in, I have not met the landowner - and ten days ago they brought home some chickens. Three roosters and one hen. (?) Seemed odd to me, but I'm not familiar with backyard chicken strategy so what do I know? Plus maybe ... they are holding a rooster or two for a friend? Or plan to get a lot more hens? In their ... standard-size back yard ... which had no coop ... where they are renting? Maybe?

Because the roosters have been crowing LIKE MAD for days, I finally peeked through the fence between our backyards to see what the heck they had there - which is when I realized they had multiple roosters and only one hen. They scrambled to start building an enclosure for them on the day they brought the chickens home (9 days ago).

It does appear to me that the roosters are NOT being kept humanely. All 3 of the roosters have been kept tethered to individual plastic lawn chairs, out in the direct sun, with no access to water or feed or shade nearly this whole time. The tether is simply a string tied around the leg; no stretch or give whatsoever. It was above 90 degrees for several days last week and they were out there at least 10 hours of the day in direct sunlight. On Monday after one week of this they replaced the plastic lawn chairs with individual bales of hay and tethered the roosters to those instead. The roosters are tethered away from each other, but within line of sight. I'm not sure where the hen is being kept as she is not typically in sight. I do not know where they are keeping the chickens at night.

So that all seems . . . well, suspicious and not entirely humane, to me. But maybe there are perfectly reasonable explanations for all of that? My plan was to simply ask them, over the fence one day whenever I could see them in the backyard with their kids or the chickens, to see what they say.

Long story still long: I looked over the fence late Thursday because the roosters were being MUCH louder than usual, and saw 1) the kids playing in the back yard in/amongst the roosters and 2) that one of the roosters' tether had gotten wrapped around the lawn chair so that the string was much too short, and he was stuck in place unable to walk. He was literally waving his leg in the air because he couldn't put it down and crowing continually. It was awful. I recorded about 20 seconds of it with my phone, and then I asked one of the children playing if they could unwrap his string as he was stuck.

The child said: "But these roosters are mean" followed by "These are fighting roosters". I backed away and started reviewing the images I'd taken throughout the week, and only then did I realize the lack of water, shade, how much time they'd been tethered, etc. Ugh.

I notified Animal Control immediately the next morning and they opened a case, took my statement, images, and video clips. But they have since said "the birds look healthy, and there's no evidence of fighting. We can't charge them until/unless they've actually fought the birds." They agree it's very weird to have this many roosters and only one hen. (They also wish there was SOME regulations to help them keep chickens safer in this area).

So now my neighbors have been contacted by Animal Control, almost certainly are aware that I'm who reported them, and nothing has been done (that I'm aware of) to prevent them from doing something horrific.

OR. Am I completely wrong here and I've falsely accused innocent people of planning to commit a horrific crime? Argh! I don't want to be that busybody neighbor! Before I was annoyed at the constant all-day crowing and now I'm much more terrified for these safety of these roosters.

Help! Thoughts?

Are you really posting pictures online of someone else’s chickens and yard? You are way way out of line. You should mind your own business or get a hobby so you’ll have less time to worry about what other people are doing.

 

[The Moonshiner]

Yea but putting up a 4x8 sheet of plywood so u cant see thru it is suspicous. Lol. give it a month

Suspicious indeed.
I mean what normal person would limit the neighbors from having full viewing access to their complete property.
I've built my chicken house, dog house and outhouse with Plexiglas because I have that kind of common courtesy.
Some neighbors just suck.

 

[roosterhavoc]

 

[OhZark Biddies]

This was my concern as well. There are no DOORS for the chickens to come in/out of . .at least not from this view. But people can see down through the chicken wire just fine.

But this is a residential street with neighbors everywhere. No way they could have an 'event' here without TONS of people noticing, and I mean instantly. ! I'm perplexed by so many things.

you should spy on them, post pictures of their children on the internet, call the authorities based only on ideas you invented in your imagination, and then continue to spin up unfounded theories online with strangers, and then …

wait… that all started to sound a little crazy once I typed it out… maybe you should just walk next door and… I don’t know?… talk to them?

 

[Kessel23]

Actually - no, that's not how things went at all. Allow me to clarify. The chickens showed up on Sunday (a week ago) and were very loud, immediately. You couldn't NOT notice the roosters crowing; they are 30 feet away from my living room and crowing non-stop for hours daily; there were also construction noises going on that day from what I could hear. On Monday I went over to see just how many chickens there were, saw the enclosure they'd constructed, and then because I literally had no idea, I looked online and made a call to learn if there were any regulations about number of chickens or roosters in residential areas here because it's never really come up before, and nope - there are not for this area. Hence I didn't call Animal Control or anyone else, because as far as I know they are NOT breaking any laws. That was Monday. Sucks for me, as it's been continually super loud and relentlessly so, but oh well. And I did intend to chat with the new neighbors and see what their plans are, as soon as I encountered them in the yard or on the street. In the meantime, when I mentioned to friends that I had new loud chickens next door and that they were mostly roosters and only one hen - multiple people asked me about if I thought they were for fighting and I dismissed it immediately. It's quirky to have roosters instead of hens around here, but there could be any number of reasonable explanations for that choice. I guess?

I took pictures of the chickens on Monday - visible from my back yard through the fence - because frankly I don't know anything about chickens and wanted to send a picture to friend to confirm those WERE in fact roosters not hens.

I heard roosters all day, all last week, all the daylight hours. Nothing to be done about it, so no I didn't call anyone. I didn't go back and take another look until the roosters were super loud and agitated on Thursday evening around 7pm; they usually quieted down by then each day, but that day they were crowing louder and more frequently for quite some time. It was also 95 degrees that day which is much hotter than usual around here, and I was a little concerned since they'd been out there all day. I went over to my fence and that was when I could see that the one rooster - tethered just 2 feet away from the fence so very clearly visible - seemed to be in distress due to the short tether, and specifically this is how the conversation went when I saw one of the kids in the backyard playing nearby:

Me: Hey there, can you loosen the tether on this one's leg? It's wrapped up and he's stuck.
Boy: These birds are mean, though.
Me: Sure, but they don't deserve to suffer, right? That string there is wrapped up around the chair leg and he can't walk or put his leg down.
Boy: Well these are roosters for fighting.
Me: Oh. Okay.

The next day - Friday - I contacted Animal Control to ask them to investigate. It felt like a reasonable concern given how long those roosters had been tethered outside in the heat all week, and based on what the boy had specifically said. If he hadn't said "fighting roosters" I wouldn't have called Animal Control at all. I haven't been back over there to take a look since I called Animal Control.

Animal Control didn't come out until yesterday (Tuesday) afternoon - their truck was driving down the street as I was driving away - and I do not know what they have determined to be honest. My hope is that they said something to the neighbors about more humane care and called it a day. I sincerely hope that I *am* wrong, and that I owe my neighbors a huge apology. I was just not prepared for someone to just come out and say "these are roosters for fighting", you know?

I was honestly hoping someone here could tell me some plausible reasons for having multiple roosters in a small residential yard, when what little I can find online says specifically NOT to have multiple roosters in smaller areas because they WILL fight each other and it will inevitably end tragically for one of the roosters. ? There are tons of people with hens for eggs around these parts - really, tons - but I've never heard of anyone intentionally choosing several adult roosters on purpose before. It's a first for our neighborhood for sure.

And that's how events unfolded. No, the kids haven't been annoying me (or anyone?) and I haven't even seen the adults in the house since they moved in, nor heard them either (until chicken arrival day). If someone says they intend to 'fight animals' I take those comments seriously. Time will tell, I guess.

Thanks to the folks who gave me their honest opinions, I do appreciate it.

Chickens can handle the heat, especially those breeds. They don't crow because they are in distress, it's a territorial call. If they are crowing more it's not because they are over heating or being cared for improperly. It just shows they are healthy and strong.

Here are some plausible reasons-
They took them for a friend who had to many
They are using them for shows
They want to have some sort of breeding project and plan to get more hens and other birds once their coop is done
They found them at a swap and didn't want to pass up the deal so they got all 3 even before they were ready because they didn't know when they would get a chance to more birds of that breed
They are planning to eat 2 of them and only are keeping one
They could be planning to eat all of them
They might have some friends who want them but aren't set up for them yet either so they are holding onto them.
There is a dozen other plausible reasons, you're never going to know what the true reason is unless you go and ask them.

You will get used to the crows. I have a dozen roosters here, there was 2 crowing underneath my bedroom window last morning when I got up. If that was a big deal for you then Idk why you would move into an area where there was no restrictions on keeping roosters.

Also, roosters fight all the time naturally and it's fine. These ones have their spurs, they have their combs, they have there wattles. If they were currently being used for illegal cock fighting they would not have any of those.

 

[shawluvsbirds]

asked one of the children playing

The parents may have said something to the effect of "these are mean fighting chickens don't get near them" as a scare tactic to keep the kids from messing with them and possibly getting injured.
Especially if they haven't had them very long and are unsure how the roosters will act around the children.