chickens in a built-up neighbourhood

[IOnceAdoredARodent]

Do chickens (not roosters) make a lot of noise? Obviously I'd be blandishing the neighbours with an egg or two.

Hen don't make a lot of noise, except they like to tell you when they've laid an egg. The may cackle for about ten minutes or so (or less, or not at all) to let everyone know! But it you shoo them off the egg they normally stop. Otherwise they are very quiet.

And OnceAdoredARodent I don't think you'll do that again if you get chickens.

Cockerl's can be very noisy so it's very anti social. Whilst some people wont mind, others will have sleep disturbance anyway(babies, carers etc).

It's hard to complain politely when you haven't slept, if you go ahead, be prepared to get your head bitten off.

Noise isn’t the problem but rats are. Where you have chickens you also have rats aplenty. That’s fine at the bottom of a half acre garden but might be an issue in a built up area.

Hmm yeah that's a good point crumbs, we used to just shoot them when we were in the country... suspect that would go down less well in town!

We’ve just taken 5 chickens on from these guys....

www.bhwt.org.uk/rehome-some-hens/

You don’t need a cockerel, so just get lovely quiet muttering hens. Preferably rescue ones.

Check if there are any restrictions in your area or in your house deeds - the place we are about to move into prohibits keeping any kind of livestock apart from domestic pets. As a courtesy it might be worth checking with your immediate neighbours as well.

Chickens are great but be prepared to fence them well - they can be very nosy and destructive! Ours as a kid were very free range - as in they'd wander all over the place and then take themselves off to roost in the henhouse on a night. I have very vivid memories of them systematically lining up and dive-bombing the mesh my DM had put up to protect her newly planted flower bed, until it finally bent enough to allow them access so that they could get in and make it into a huge dust bath

They attract rats

Just be prepared to keep the chickens after they stop laying after a couple of years.

Or wring their necks and turn them into stock

Either way

My neighbours had chickens, which I could cope with. Then they bought a cockerel which learned to crow just before I decided to put my house on the market. They then decided it would be ok to let the cockerel roam freely round their garden. Late one night I looked out of the window and saw a fox lurking in their garden. A couple of days later I saw the neighbours & alerted them to the potential problem. Too late, alas!

Foxes? There seem to be more of them in towns than the country these days. I live in a London suburb and often see one in broad daylight. The chickens would need v secure living quarters, day and night.

Cross post, Mrs Fezziwig!

My neighbours had chickens and they woke me up a lot even though they were not that close to my bedroom window. i could easily sleep through normal birds such as the local crows and pidgeons but the chickens were a lot worse. 😟

I don't know if some breeds are noisier than others? 🤷🏻‍♀️

I would adore some chickens.

My neighbour complained, though I think she was incapable of telling the difference between chickens and rooks because she had a go at me one morning when I had been awake since 4 and there was no way my birds had made a noise that day.
They could be very squawky at dawn when they laid though and it is difficult to exclude every crack of light from a henhouse when you want to keep it ventilated.

Hmm, if you live rurally then great, but if not it’s a pretty dick move, especially without consulting your neighbours first.
They are noisy, they shit literally everywhere and move likely your garden will stink of it in the summer heat, which is not considerate for neighbours th@t can’t then enjoy their own garden because of the smell.

If you own your home I’d look very carefully at the deeds to see what they say about keeping poultry and likewise if you rent you should check was your tenancy agreement says as I know mine specifies no poultry to be kept at my address.

My next door neighbour has chickens, about 5. They cluck a bit but are pretty quiet. I hear them mainly on a morning, but they are not loud or a nuisance. They often make a strange, low crooning noise, which I quite like. They do occasionally crow. I thought next door had got a cockeral at one point, but it was one of the hens.
There is a farm further down the road, with cockerals and next door told me hens will "call" at the cockeral (??). It wasnt over loud and stopped after a bit.

They do occasionally come into my garden, and I have cat. They have seen off the cat and he enjoys stalking them now from a distance. He gets pecked if he gets too close.

TheCountessofFitzdotterel

when I complained to the family at the back of me about the noise that their rooster made, they were of the same opinion as you.

I was the third person that I know of that went round to complain, and I know of three others that complained to the council about it.

Our neighbours had chickens for years and the only issue was the one that would be so proud itself for having laid an egg that it would sing a I HAVE LAID AN EGG song in appreciation of its wonderment of itself

I'm feeling very nostalgic for the crooning noise they make bert - I'd forgotten about that until you mentioned it. It's oddly soothing.

My two are very quiet, you only hear them when they announce that they have laid an egg so once a day at most for 5-10 minutes. I am very careful to lock them in at night in the summer purely to stop them shouting when the sun comes up and they want out!

Out next door neighbours have them, I don't mind the clucking. I do mind the dead rats the cats bring home that weren't there before the chickens.

I think the rats must be attracted by the chicken feed or scraps or whatever.

I didn't have a rooster.