Did you know that even in the City of Los Angeles, you can raise chickens in a regular, residential zone? You don't need to be located in the agricultural zone (which still exists in many parts of the City) to raise fowl (though there are restrictions for raising horses, goats, etc.). In fact, all you need to do to raise chickens for eggs or other uses is meet a few criteria.
First, the easy one is chickens (hens): they must be cooped at least 20 feet from the owner's dwelling and at least 35 feet from any neighbor's dwelling. Now, for roosters, ducks, and turkeys, you have to keep them in a coop or roost at least 20 feet from their owners swelling and at least 100 feet from the nearest neighbor's dwelling. Pretty simple, right?
I guess the question is: why in some areas do you see chickens roaming the front yards and streets even? If you see fowl or poultry roaming the streets, just call 311 and report what you see so that an animal services officer can come out and assess the situation and make sure the few, simple rules are being followed.
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6 comments:
Thanks for looking this up. I'm not going to say, however, where I regularly see a stray hen. She's a bit of a neighborhood icon and a nice bit of country in the city.
A few years ago, I found chickens literally crossing the street in Atwater Village. Not even a joke.
Plus, whenever I walk the dogs in the morning, I frequently hear roosters greeting the morning.
Throw those two things with the sounds of trains going through the neighborhood, and it's easy to see why Atwater can be quite a throwback to a different time.
Meanwhile, it has one of the most diverse populations of any hood in the city.
And don't forget the Freeway Chickens. When I was growing up in Burbank, there was a whole bunch of them living the good life along the Ventura Fwy next to Buena Vista (now Johhny Carson) Park near NBC.
I walk dogs and there is one house in Brentwood where the chickens hang in the yard. It's pretty funny and gets the pooches very excited.
I've known about this law since I was a small child, as the neighbors called Animal Control on us many times to ensure that our coops were however many feet away from our neighbors' structures as they had to be. One yuppie couple really had it in for us. They couldn't stand the sounds a hen makes when she was laying an egg.
Strangely, that same couple wasn't distrubed by power lawn mowers their gardeners used, or by the guy across the alley in garage using a massive compressor, or any of the other mechanized noises one hears in a typical suburb.
Chickens are great little animals, if you have a back yard to raise them in. Hens eat all the vegetable table scraps you can generate, they provide you with great fertilizer, and you get good eggs from them if you take care of them.
I have raised many varieties of chickens in Hollywood, North Hollywood and now in Sylmar for the past 37 years. Many folks like the sound of roosters crowing as long as they`re far enough away. I`ve only had two or three complaints in all these years.
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