Ribh's D'Coopage

[Ribh]

Good morning everyone! Happy Saturday It's election day here, we'll be choosing our next government in peace and (I hope) respect and camaraderie, with a sausage sizzle at the polling stations and maybe a few charities selling second-hand books or hand-knitted scarves and beanies yay! Can't wait to pop around there and have my say!

UGH! I have dreaded this election. I always feel: It doesn't matter who you vote for, a politician always gets in. I'm hoping everyone votes wisely.

 

[MaryJanet]

Yeh, it's not the options on the table I'm celebrating, but a functional, peaceful democracy in which many voices are heard.

 

[rjohns39]

Which party has the best chicken-related policies, I wonder? Hahaha

You jest, but there was a county in Virginia that spent five years replacing the county counsel to change chicken laws. It was a well funded campaign by an organization focused on putting chickens in everyone's back yard.

 

[MaryJanet]

To me (and what I know about local government in Virginia would fit on a flea's kneecap), the most astounding thing about that story is that (I presume) people were prevented by council by-laws from having chickens in the first place. Which sounds like their interests were not considered when those by-laws were established. And that means the local government was not doing it's job properly.

 

[rjohns39]

To me (and what I know about local government in Virginia would fit on a flea's kneecap), the most astounding thing about that story is that (I presume) people were prevented by council by-laws from having chickens in the first place. Which sounds like their interests were not considered when those by-laws were established. And that means the local government was not doing it's job properly.

Absolutely true. And most of the counsel was in some fashion or another on Tyson's payroll. This was a rural community that always had poultry... Tyson's moved in and all that ended.

If you want to read about some of the creativity of the group, they're link is in the last post in the sticky thread in the ordinances forum. They've also started the rental chicken program along with baby sit my birds program and the chicken underground. All to circumvent local laws or regulations. Some on the neighbor hood level, others at the county and city level.

When I lived in the DC area it cost $450 for me to have a chicken permit. But two blocks away they were allowed to have chickens without a license. Needless to say I didn't get chickens until I moved to Tennessee, where I'm zoned agricultural and am a legally registered farm.

 

[MaryJanet]

I'm counting myself very lucky today. Where I live, there's no permit required for chickens, and permanent structures smaller than 4m2 do not require permits. So I could add the coop and chooks without any paperwork. But there are noise and smell regulations, which are fair enough because I don't want noisy or smelly neighbours. If my neighbours lodged formal noise or smell complaints the council would order me to do something about it, and if I failed to carry out the order, penalties would apply. And that's all there is to it.

 

[MaryJanet]

$450 seems extremely steep to me.

 

[Ribh]

In an evening dominated by election results ~ & seriously, just tell me in the morning, ok~ I managed to catch the weather report, which is predicting a week of solid rain. So it was out early to run through chicken chores, though I gotta wonder why I bother. The big girls preferred to drink out of the old water container still full of leaf litter than the fresh clean water. They deliberately tipped over the small feed container so they could scratch around in it. Two somehow missed the gate & had to be rounded up. Like I gave up strenuous exercise the day I left school. Chasing chooks around their perimeter is not my idea of the ideal way to start my day. Guess everybody was just happy to see a little bit of sunshine.

Meanwhile the coop was getting that distinctly chooky aroma because it keeps raining & making it hard to do my regular poop clean but we finally managed to convince my 3 girls it was a far, far better thing to let me loose with a rake to clean up & pile everything in a heap for them to scavenge through [yes, totally disgusting & gives them so much pleasure] as well as finding the sand they've successfully managed to bury under leaf litter so everyone can still dust bath no matter how much rain falls out of the sky. And, yes, only 3 birds but 2 feeders because Lottie's idea of bliss with everyone else out of the coop is to sit in the feeder & scoff leisurely while the Campines run around frantically screaming. Two eggs before sunrise this morning. Well done, Ha'penny & Soda!

 

[rjohns39]

Morning Jeannie Only birds I've had that leave the feed in the trough and not toss it out have been meat birds. The heritage birds seem to think it's a sin to eat feed from the feeder.

 

[rjohns39]

Oh, and BTW... My butt has been kicked by my lower pasture. Took me 14 hours manually to do what I could do with the right machinery in an hour. I'm exhausted, sweaty and worst of all stinky. Got over 100F out today.