The Maine Sunday Telegram ran a story yesterday on the growing popularity of backyard chickens in Maine’s cities, the gist of which was that initial fears about noise, odor and the like have failed to materialize and the city birds are getting along just fine with their human neighbors.
That’s noteworthy because two of the cities cited in the article, Portland and South Portland, are densely populated, with 3,106 people per square mile in Portland and 2,085 people per square mile in South Portland. As urban chicken keeping takes flight, so to speak, the headline on the story said city officials are hearing “nary a peep” from unhappy neighbors.
Augusta, the Maine city where Liz and I live, has a lower population density than Portland and South Portland, but our house is on a busy street in a thickly settled urban neighborhood. Our large (by city standards) oddly shaped lot borders seven properties, including six household yards. (The seventh parcel holds a former fire station that the city uses for storage.)
Since we began keeping chickens (no roosters!) more than a year ago now, none of our neighbors has complained about the hens, even though they can be a bit noisy when demanding snacks and while laying.
For the most part, our four chickens - two adult hens and two pullets that are five months old - keep the chatter down to a gentle clucking. I clean the coop daily and compost the poop; odor has not been a problem. And the chickens have not attracted any rodents. The only non-human visitors they get are neighborhood cats, who seem to be content watching “the girls” from a distance.
Not only has there been no grumbling from neighbors, but some of them have shown an interest in the chickens. One woman visits the hens periodically; members of her family helped us round up the pullets when they escaped on their first day here. Another neighbor says her dog is quite intrigued by the chickens, watching them quietly from his side of the fence.
As South Portland’s city manager told the newspaper: “Personally, I find it pretty neat to drive through neighborhoods and see chickens walking around people’s yards.”
