Backyard Chickens
Just over a week ago I purchased three Rhode Island Red chickens and set up my first brooder in the basement. I have been considering raising chickens for some time and finally decided now was the time. The long winter gave me plenty of time to research and plan for their arrival. They have been growing so fast and already have quite the personalities. What is fascinating is the shift over the last hundred years of backyard chickens from being normal, to banned in cities, and now back to allowed with regulations.
Recently I was mapping properties in the South Bottoms National Register Historic District here in Lincoln, an area notable for its concentration of Germans from Russia in the early 20th century. As one of the older historic districts, many of the survey forms indicated remnants of a more rural existence in the heart of the city. Among several barns were dozens of chicken coops, which seemed standard with the small single-family homes. So what happened from then to now?
The backyard chickens of 100 years ago were raised out of necessity. They provided a steady supply of daily eggs to feed the family and/or sell to neighbors with relatively little work and not a lot of space. During WWI they actually became an important part of the war effort back home. Raising chickens helped lessen the strain with food supplies going overseas to help with the war effort. A poster promoting the raising of chickens in 1918 read “In time of peace a profitable recreation, in time of war a patriotic duty.”
After WWII the government no longer needed families to contribute to raising their own food and stopped promoting the backyard chicken. Combined with the decline in small, local food chains and the rise in the supermarket, most families stopped raising chickens. It was cheaper to buy a carton of eggs at the supermarket shipped in from a massive poultry operation than it was to feed and maintain a small backyard flock.
In addition, the housing boom and rise of suburbia that came after WWII included a number of restrictive covenants. Most new neighborhoods included prohibitions on raising any livestock on the lots in order to preserve an orderly and peaceful environment. In some instances, these types of restrictions were in place even before the war, as was the case for my neighborhood which was built in the 1920s and 30s.
In areas where restrictive covenants were not in effect, the city took over the responsibility of prohibiting such “noxious uses” and banned any raising of livestock within city limits. This new trend continued for many decades until finally, residents in urban areas began to push back.
With so many people interested in raising chickens again, many cities have relaxed their bans and allowed these feathered pets with a few stipulations. I’m not sure any cities allow roosters, but most now allow chickens up to a certain number provided there is enough run space per chicken. Also common are setbacks to lot lines and distances from the habitable portion of neighboring homes. While the regulations can be a bit of a pain, they provide a nice balance for those wanting chickens and other city dwellers who may not find them as charming.
The backyard chicken movement saw another spike during the Pandemic when everyone was looking for a new hobby to replace the time they formerly spent out in public. Raising chickens proved to be a very popular new hobby not only to kill time, but to control at least one aspect of the supply chain which was so disrupted during the Pandemic. There are a number of reasons people want chickens in their backyard and it usually isn’t related to saving money. Assuming $5 for a carton of farm fresh eggs each week, it will take me roughly 2 years to make up the costs just to get the coop up and running, not to mention feeding them for the next 2 years. While some people have the space for a decent sized flock to sell the eggs, the homes with 2-3 chickens are usually doing it for the joy of raising chickens and knowing where their eggs came from. They’re like pets with a bonus of daily fresh eggs.
It will be interesting to watch where the urban chicken movement goes next and whether we return to WWI levels of chicken raising or if like many Pandemic fads, the backyard chicken fades away.
