Minnesota!

[Minniechickmama]

Welcome aboard, cuppycake. Good luck getting your permit.
Now, we should inform you of the drama that is going on in Minnesota. duluthralphie has got some real juicy happenings going on at his place. You might want to check in daily so as to not miss out

Ralphie, just thought of this one...
We're not ones to go 'round spreadin' rumors,
Really we're just not the gossiping kind,
You'll never hear one of us repeating gossip,
So you better be sure and listen close the first time.

I hope death's doorstep hasn't slammed you today. Bert needs you, man.

 

[duluthralphie]

Spring is in the air!

Of course the 14 below tomorrow night is going to kill the spring..

I just went out and checked on the birds. I brought Ray and the "Creamettes" some salad. They were happy with it, I then gave them new scratch. I checked for eggs and no eggs from them yet. I got one each of the first two days I had them here and none since! They seem to be getting more comfortable so hopefully I will get some soon. I picked up one of the "creamettes" and she was not fighting it, much. They seem to be friendly birds.

Of course this upset the white rock. She always comes running to greet me and follows me everywhere. She was not happy when I gave the Cream leg bars salad and she got none. I gave her scratch but that was not good enough. she started scolding me. I am starting to think she is spoiled rotten.

Bert was not ready to go into the coop for the night, so I guess it will mean another trip out.

JJ was following me like the dog he thinks he is. I was paying so much attention to the other birds he looked sad eyed at me. I was forced to pick him up and scratch him and pat his chest. There is something wrong when I have to hold a full grown Tom to keep him happy!

Of course, this made Ethel Jealous. She did not want to be held though. I had to sit on a bucket and let her come over and talk to me and tell me her days woes. She is such a gossip! She follows your saying Minnie, She only tells you once and you better be listening!

The Jakes must have been fighting all day long. All four of them have bloody heads again. One looks like it will be a solid scab in a few days. Stupid birds.... And of course one of the jakes was trying to impress the white rock with a mating dance......She ignored him...

On the way back to the house. with the white rock following me, Ole came running to greet me. Actually, It appears he ignored me and went right for the white rock. He did a dance for her too, which she ignored... I think she is like a stuck up high school cheerleader that thinks she is hotter than she really is... To me the white rock is just not the hot looking...But at my age I probably forgot what a hot chick looks like....


I failed to get eggs in the incubator today, so a goal for tomorrow...

 

[ejb3810]

Welcome Cuppycake. I am in Hermantown and know nothing of the Duluth ordinance. Be careful about the coop location.
There was a Dr. in Duluth that had a heat lamp in the coop which was too close to the house. When the coop went up in flames so did the house. $500,000 in damage as I recall.
The Duluth Facebook group may be of help?
Ralphie, I hope that Judy does not read your posts. She may not take kindly to the forgetting what a hot chick looks like comment.

 

[Chickenchick11]

Hey all. While I'm not necessarily new to chickens or the forum really, I am relatively new to MN. I now live in Duluth!

I'm also wondering if anyone here keeps chickens inside the city limits of Duluth. I've looked at the ordinance and license application, but want to get some firsthand info from fellow keepers. Are the site plans and inspection difficult to pass? Are there any local meet ups or swaps I can participate in?

Thanks!

Hello and welcome to our Minnesota thread! I'm not in Duluth so I sadly can't help you. I'm farther north than Duluth.

 

[starbuck123]

Hey all. While I'm not necessarily new to chickens or the forum really, I am relatively new to MN. I now live in Duluth!

I'm also wondering if anyone here keeps chickens inside the city limits of Duluth. I've looked at the ordinance and license application, but want to get some firsthand info from fellow keepers. Are the site plans and inspection difficult to pass? Are there any local meet ups or swaps I can participate in?

Thanks!

Welcome! I'm in the South Twin Cities area but i have some advice based on our experience. Before you do anything, plan anything or buy anything, go to the main office in Duluth and ask all sorts of questions. Keep on them until you get to the people who will be making the decisions and if there's any question whether or not you can have them, even see if someone from the city will come out to your home to look things over. In other words, be 100% sure you know exactly what's needed for you to proceed, as far as land space, number of chickens, sex and if there's some sort of limit on the square footage of existing outbuildings on your property (which is where we ran into a snag).

Ours was a two step process and not very well laid out at all and it caused a lot of headaches. I made some recommendations to the city and they actually changed the wording so now it's crystal clear what needs to be done. We had our permit denied 3 times and had bought the coop initially (because the way things were worded..thought we had to). But we persevered.

Anyway, in a nutshell, do your due dilligence and don't just take your friends' or neighbors' word for things - always go to someone in the city just to be on the safe side. Just my 2C.

 

[Bogtown Chick]

Oh my Gosh! I can't tell you how wonderful it is to see chickens out on my lawn again-- on sunny slopes where the snow has melted. Grazing and scratching. The Roo has a spring in his step again. The eggs are coming in from happy hens. When I think about it...The birds were really only in the Run January and February this year. Last year they were in November-April. But still 2 months is long enough for them.

But Good heavens is there crap everywhere. Dog and Chicken. tonight I'll start my least favorite yard duty> Spring pick up of the Dog dooty and chicken dooty too.

We've discovered that our Septic Drain field is partially frozen. It's been springing up in one location. Sand is bubbling up. At least it's not backing up. So we'll get the tank pumped and let mother nature do her job thawing out the field. Just not enough snow this year. We covered the pipe from the tank to the field...but that's as far as it went. House to tank pipe is insulated.

Ugh. Crap. It's just everywhere.

 

[Bogtown Chick]

Welcome! I'm in the South Twin Cities area but i have some advice based on our experience. Before you do anything, plan anything or buy anything, go to the main office in Duluth and ask all sorts of questions. Keep on them until you get to the people who will be making the decisions and if there's any question whether or not you can have them, even see if someone from the city will come out to your home to look things over. In other words, be 100% sure you know exactly what's needed for you to proceed, as far as land space, number of chickens, sex and if there's some sort of limit on the square footage of existing outbuildings on your property (which is where we ran into a snag).

Ours was a two step process and not very well laid out at all and it caused a lot of headaches. I made some recommendations to the city and they actually changed the wording so now it's crystal clear what needs to be done. We had our permit denied 3 times and had bought the coop initially (because the way things were worded..thought we had to). But we persevered.

Anyway, in a nutshell, do your due dilligence and don't just take your friends' or neighbors' word for things - always go to someone in the city just to be on the safe side. Just my 2C.

That's just smart advice Terrysgirl.

Thanks for that. Too many people get their chickens taken away for not going through the hoops--though it is aggravating there are so many hoops. Too much government. But if due diligence is not paid then the chickens suffer for it. Glad you worked through it and persisted.

 

[starbuck123]

Thanks. Our neighbors actually said to us after strike 1, 'oh, just get the chickens and don't tell the city'. Tempting, but that only hurts the other people down the road when the city comes back and punishes the whole class for one kid screwing around. I'm not a fan of government in general and all their rules but sometimes you just have to follow them and play nice. I was completely pleasant and professional in all my dealings with everyone in the admin building and it worked - they worked with me, helped me each time my permit was denied until we came to an agreement. It was frustrating to run into obstacles - that first call to me telling me my permit was denied just about gave me a heart attack as we already had the coop built, delivered and set into a spot that we had specifically cleared and leveled, but I wanted this badly enough and persisted. I hope anyone reading this who is foraying into this for the first time can avoid the headaches we did by doing homework and talking to the govt. people first..even if you THINK you know what the rules are by talking to friends or reading the ordinance online, plus sometimes people who work in the city have differing ideas of what's allowed - some were uninformed and i was dealing with both the city planning dept as well as animal control. Wording can be really tricky. So many people in our city worked to get an ordinance passed in the first place and the last thing I want to do is get a hand slap and have chickens get a bad rap and/or eventually be not allowed within city limits.

So, we did it backward, accidentially.

1) We read the rules, bought the coop, set it outside and submitted plans to the city. DENIED. Our outbuilding + the coop=too many suare feet. (in our defense, the ordinance talked about someone coming out to inspect the coop, then a permit would be granted, so we assumed we needed to buy a suitable coop first. We had one built with the required footage, thinking it would be approved, no problem. This wording has since been changed in the city ordinance at my request, as in talking to folks at the city, others had done the same thing as we had and were denied due to confusing wording).

2) We read the rules, talked to folks at the city, submitted plans to put wheels on the coop as a mobile tractor and technically not a stationary structure? DENIED. Not allowed.

3) Decided we would have to now put the coop in the garage as to just get it out of the yard...dragged it into the garage. DENIED. Needs an outdoor run.

4) Had long conversations with 5-6 different city people + animal control. Talked some more. Made numerous visits and phone calls. Submitted a new set of plans, with pictures of our coop, garage, location, etc, and articles about which chickens are awesome and everything with plans showing how we'd construct an outside run. APPROVED!!

We have been granted a sort of provisionary permit, meaning I have to call the animal control guy to come out and take a final look at what we've built, then we get the city's blessing. But basically we have the okay. Had I gone to the city first and talked, talked, talked, I'd avoided a lot of headaches.



Bogtown - I will be doing poop duty this afternoon. I need to locate a hazmat suit. We're talking 2 dogs, 2 turds over the course of 5 months. That's a lotta ----. Haha. I don't want to even do the math.

 

[duluthralphie]

Oh my Gosh! I can't tell you how wonderful it is to see chickens out on my lawn again-- on sunny slopes where the snow has melted. Grazing and scratching. The Roo has a spring in his step again. The eggs are coming in from happy hens. When I think about it...The birds were really only in the Run January and February this year. Last year they were in November-April. But still 2 months is long enough for them.

But Good heavens is there crap everywhere. Dog and Chicken. tonight I'll start my least favorite yard duty> Spring pick up of the Dog dooty and chicken dooty too.

We've discovered that our Septic Drain field is partially frozen. It's been springing up in one location. Sand is bubbling up. At least it's not backing up. So we'll get the tank pumped and let mother nature do her job thawing out the field. Just not enough snow this year. We covered the pipe from the tank to the field...but that's as far as it went. House to tank pipe is insulated.

Ugh. Crap. It's just everywhere.

I have found a way to simplify the poop problem. I have my dogs trained to eat chicken poop. They never stop eating chicken poop. If I think of my dogs as loving pets it make me cringe. So instead I think of them as "self contained mobile chicken poop compactors". After they have compacted the chicken poop, most of it is deposited in the tall grass in the woods automatically. The little that is left in the front yard is easily removed by my wife. A totally hands free operation for me!

 

[Bogtown Chick]

.....

Ralphie...


The large labrador already is doing her recycling job. She just brings it up closer to the house and recycles it around the house.

And when you step in those landmines you know you have something on your shoes. At least the chicken poo scuffs off in two strides.

I have 3 feed bags down at the coop with frosty chicken turds. waiting to be hauled to my parent's and friend's gardens and compost piles. (My garden is primed for the season already) and she digs in those bags like she's at a movie theater eating popcorn. Ugh. When I get back up to the house with her I need to remind the kids, "No Kisses." She's been at the coop.

And how is it that you and my DH get out of scoopin' poop duty...LOL. It's the waiting game. You boys can deal with messy...us gals can't.


OMG Terrysgirl...what a riga-marow. I would have went crazy. Dealing with people like that just drives me nuts. It's the total inefficiency of government that just blows my mind. Okay...I'll stop...I'll sink into politics.