Silkie_Mom
Songster
Okay so this has been going on the past few weeks and I've been losing my mind over it. But hopefully my post gives others a glimmer of hope in dark times. Sorry it's a bit lengthy. Maybe one day I'll write a book on my chicken adventures and this will be a chapter lol.
We live in a very rural area but the nearby city is closing in. And fast. One day there was a letter in the mail stating after an investigation we lost our grandfathering because we didnt have chickens for a year. If we wanted to be grandfathered again, we had to prove we had chickens the past 30 years (yes I said 30!). Heck I'm only 29 myself, and I have to prove this property has had chickens before I was even born!? Needless to say I was freaking out something major. I immediately had my dear friend/landlord on the phone.
About a week later (which felt like months) my friend gave me the dreaded call. He couldnt reach anyone to fight the letter. He told us he couldn't afford to take this to court and if nothing changed we would have to get rid of our chickens by the deadline. Panic of the highest level.
How would I tell my kids? Where would my babies go? After all, I have about 50. Who would foster that many chickens while we sorted this out? What about the tiny babies in the brooder? Panic. Lots and lots of panic.
Somewhere in between asking friends with chickens if they would have room for our little bunch and creating plans for secret coops, we got a call late one night. My heart sank when I saw the name. Time was most likely up. I answered my friend's call and hoped it was about anything else.
He finally got a hold of the code enforcement officer. He told the officer there's no way to prove there have been chickens. Chickens could live anywhere. A coop, storage shed, dog house, tree, behind a piece of wood propped up against the house... The fact we built our slightly massive coop recently was only because we increased our flock. And he told the officer we got rid of our roosters, which I'll admit were a bit loud in the morning (aka 3am). And that if the officer needed statements from the neighbors saying we've had our chickens, he was prepared to get them. My friend told the officer we are just a little family trying to get by. That I feed my family from our little flock of chickens. That they mean the world to us.
The code enforcement officer gave in! He told our friend that one of our neighbors had filed a complaint about the noise and as long as we kept it down, the chickens could stay. We also have to move our coop further from the fence line. Apparently now it is considered a building structure and has different rules we broke without realising it. Chicken parents be aware!
So there you have it. My little story on how sometimes things really do work out. Make lots of calls. Push, push, push. You never know what will happen
We live in a very rural area but the nearby city is closing in. And fast. One day there was a letter in the mail stating after an investigation we lost our grandfathering because we didnt have chickens for a year. If we wanted to be grandfathered again, we had to prove we had chickens the past 30 years (yes I said 30!). Heck I'm only 29 myself, and I have to prove this property has had chickens before I was even born!? Needless to say I was freaking out something major. I immediately had my dear friend/landlord on the phone.
About a week later (which felt like months) my friend gave me the dreaded call. He couldnt reach anyone to fight the letter. He told us he couldn't afford to take this to court and if nothing changed we would have to get rid of our chickens by the deadline. Panic of the highest level.
How would I tell my kids? Where would my babies go? After all, I have about 50. Who would foster that many chickens while we sorted this out? What about the tiny babies in the brooder? Panic. Lots and lots of panic.
Somewhere in between asking friends with chickens if they would have room for our little bunch and creating plans for secret coops, we got a call late one night. My heart sank when I saw the name. Time was most likely up. I answered my friend's call and hoped it was about anything else.
He finally got a hold of the code enforcement officer. He told the officer there's no way to prove there have been chickens. Chickens could live anywhere. A coop, storage shed, dog house, tree, behind a piece of wood propped up against the house... The fact we built our slightly massive coop recently was only because we increased our flock. And he told the officer we got rid of our roosters, which I'll admit were a bit loud in the morning (aka 3am). And that if the officer needed statements from the neighbors saying we've had our chickens, he was prepared to get them. My friend told the officer we are just a little family trying to get by. That I feed my family from our little flock of chickens. That they mean the world to us.
The code enforcement officer gave in! He told our friend that one of our neighbors had filed a complaint about the noise and as long as we kept it down, the chickens could stay. We also have to move our coop further from the fence line. Apparently now it is considered a building structure and has different rules we broke without realising it. Chicken parents be aware!
So there you have it. My little story on how sometimes things really do work out. Make lots of calls. Push, push, push. You never know what will happen
