My chickens and I were on the news last night!

[chickenboy7c2d]

wow

 

[Nifty-Chicken]

 

[The Lisser]

Awesome!!!

Melissa

 

[geojane42]

Thanks everyone! We're only allowed to have 4 hens but I already have 5 and 3 babies. We have an enormous yard and the neighbours think the chicken are great so I think I can probably get away with having 8. Right now we have 2 Marans', 2 Hamburgs, and one bantum that I think is a dorking/campine cross because she has red ear lobes but lays white eggs (the most delicious ones of all too!). We have 3 polish babies and we're getting a couple more babies next week... a Buff Orpington and a Barred Rock. The plan was to only keep one of the Polish babies (the golden laced one) but I've fallen in love with the silver laced one so we'll probably keep them both. We have an absolutely beautiful buff laced baby too that we'll probably end up keeping too unless I can find a really good home for her and she's shy and snuggly. We'll probably get a few more babies than we plan on keeping this time around too as with the new bylaw in effect here now, I don't think I'll have any trouble selling them when they're legal age (we're not actually allowed to have chickens under 4 months old).

I've already started collecting material to expand the coop even though I only just finished it last weekend!

There were several negative comments on the news web site last time I checked regarding rats and mice but interestingly enough, I have 3 totally unused traps around my coop. The critters in my area seem much more interested in bird seed than chicken feed. My neighbours have them on their porch with their bird feeders and I haven't seen a single mouse or rat since I got my chickens.

 

[PhilErvin]

Quote:
ARE YOU KIDDING ME ???

I have never heard of such an ordinance. What would be their reason for that??

 

[illegal avian]

Well done!

Read the comments on the TV station website about the story... talk about mind-numbed sheople!

Sorry Canadian citizen with brain we are government plebes and we are owned you better surrender now!

 

[geojane42]

They say that the reason for the age restriction is to ensure that people don't end up with roosters since roosters are not allowed. Personally, I'm not totally opposed to the idea because I think it will cut down on the number of "oh what a cute little baby chick" impulse buys and in doing so cut down on the number of abandoned and/or neglected chickens when they aren't so cute any more. The problem with it is that when you buy chickens off a farm, they are not pets and really don't think much of people at all. It has taken 2 months for 2 out of my 5 hens to warm up to me enough to eat out of my hand. The other 3 would rather I just stay away from them all together. So we decided to get chicks that we could hand raise because we think they'll make better back yard chickens. We're getting some more next week and will get some extras so we can pass them along to friends/neighbours who want 4 month olds who don't hate them.

The problem with ending up with roosters is that you have to get rid of them and we're not allowed to slaughter them and there's no reason why anyone would drive all the way into the city to pick up a rooster when they could easily get one out in the sticks.

Here are the new restrictions/bylaws if anyone is interested:

http://vancouver.ca/ctyclerk/cclerk/20100408/documents/penv3.pdf

 

[dntd]

I hope my city follows suit as we tend to be followers, always wanting to copy I currently have 6 layers and 4 bamtoms,I would hate to have to get rid of them!