i feel your pain; i have three backyarders in an elevated coop with an attached, meshed-in 12' x 4' run. a barred rock, an ameraucana, and a buff orpington. the ameraucana is by far the loudest, but she's always been a sort of dominant hen and a bit rooster-like. i live in suburbia, as well, with good neighbors on one side and people behind me i don't even know. there's one house on my other side that i've stayed far away from the people there since they are shady and i have reported to Code Compliance for various issues with their behaviors (mostly, incessant dog barking at all hours), so our relationship is strained, to say the least. they were the ones i was most worried about when i got the chickens. well, the chickens squawk usually once or twice during the day -- almost always around egg-laying time. though lately, two of them have hopped up on the outdoor roost and "bok-bok-bok-BOKKKK"ed in unison. and as you know, it is LOUD. it usually only lasts for 1-3 minutes. then i don't hear it again all day. but when my ameraucana wants me to come outside (i work at home), she will "BRAAAAAAK-brak-braaaaak" constantly while watching my house. the first few days i had them, i'd go outside CONSTANTLY and give them treats, i thought it was so cute and sweet. well, i learned quickly that they are pretty darn smart and learn to anticipate that i'll come out and feed them all the time, so i stopped right away! (i detail my experiences in my blog at
www.thecityhen.wordpress.com, if you want to check the earlier posts out.)
here are the things that i think are helping protect me and my flock from my shady neighbors: 1) my coop is out of their site, on the other side of my garage from their house, so the likelihood that they hear the chickens and/or know they're MINE is slim; 2) i put some extra trees in to block any view they'd have of me going out to my coop for various feedings, etc. (recommend fish-tail palms -- relatively inexpensive and HUGE at the top but not so bushy at bottom); 3) if the chickens are too loud for too long, i run out there and hiss at them (read this in one of my backyard chicken raising books) and clap and stand there until they shut up, then go back inside -- i feel terrible yelling at them, but i know how it feels to cringe at the neighbors' potential code complaints... -- and it usually works for at least awhile. i'm hoping they get the picture soon (i've only had them a little over two months.) 4) bottom line is IF you get a complaint from someone, i can't imagine how it would be any worse than people who get dog-barking complaints -- they usually just get a warning and are asked to start keeping their dogs quieter. i'm hoping it's the same if i'm on that end of the complaint.
one more note: i LOAD up their run with treats and snacks and cover them with sand and hay, hang romaine lettuce from a wire from the ceiling, fill their food bins (crumbles and scratch) so they have free choice food all day, and i'll often (if i'm gone for the day) pull weeds from the lawn and cut up some longer grass and throw it in there like confetti so they have to work to get it. i vary their snacks each day so they don't get bored. and i play Public Radio in my garage so they can hear the sound of voices and music. i know this won't completely obliterate their occasional noise, but it sure does help. if your problem is mainly in the morning, perhaps load up your run with treats the night before (after they've gone to roost) and they will come out in the morning and be focused on the food and treats. i do this every saturday eve so that i can sleep in on sundays. this past sunday, i didn't hear a peep out of them until i came out the back door at 9:30 am! and even then, it was just a few soft greetings.
my chickens are happy pullets giving me one egg each per day, so i don't believe their noise is related to unhappiness. it's definitely an inherent hen thing, and as hard as it was for me to scour the forums for solutions about how to make them quiet and read things like "oh, it's just the happy egg song!" [from people who obviously don't have scary neighbors that will turn them in], i have really had to understand and accept that they will be making noise occasionally, and IF i get a code warning, i have to deal with it then. since i've come to that conclusion, i've been a lot less stressed.
