They Have What?

The following is some information I picked up off the internet regarding the newest concept in urban farming. If you want to find the original posting, just copy the item and paste it into a search engine.
There is this new trend in the sustainable movement; it’s urban chickens. These chickens are raised in small numbers by city dwellers in their yards as a source of fresh eggs. Not surprisingly, this concept has been met with some controversy. Some people are strong supporters of the idea, while others have serious objections. Different jurisdictions have begun passing codes regarding urban chickens - some have implemented pilot projects and others don't allow it at all.
Supporters claim:[1]
It's a cheap, sustainable and "all-natural" source of eggs
It allows people to "get back to nature"
It's a more humane way to raise chickens
Watching chickens roam around the yard is enjoyable
Opponents counter with:
Farm animals should be on farms
Chickens smell.
Chickens are loud.
Chickens carry infectious diseases.
Chickens attract undesirable and potentially dangerous wildlife like rats, coyotes, skunks and foxes.
Most people don't have a clue how to raise chickens.
Here are some important points to consider if you're thinking about getting urban chickens:
Is it legal in your town?
Do your neighbors like the idea? A few chickens aren’t worth a neighborhood spat.
Do you know how to take care of chickens? If the answer is no (as for most people), are you willing to learn before you get your first chicken?
Do you have an easily accessible source of feed? If you have to drive 40 miles to get chicken feed, the project is bound to fail.
Do you have any high-risk individuals in the house? This would include the very young, very old and people with weakened immune systems, who are more prone to developing disease if exposed to infectious agents. These individuals should not be exposed to chickens.
Are you in for the long term? Commercial layer hens are generally productive for about 12 months, but some chickens can live for years.
If you decide to get rid of the chickens, what will you do? Where will they go? Setting them free or dumping them off in the country is not an ethical option. Adult hens don't make good roasting chickens, so even if you get them butchered for meat, you're probably left with stewing chicken at best.
Remember that backyard eggs are not necessarily safer than commercial eggs. Consumption of raw eggs and improper handling of eggs are risk factors for diseases like salmonella, no matter where they come from. Don't be fooled by the "all natural means safe" myth.
Personally, I would not want to raise chickens. I have my reasons, harbored since childhood when I spent a lot of time at my grandparents' farm and helped my great grandmother manage her flock.
My thoughts about chickens are that they are grubby, dull and require a lot of upkeep. From time to time, they will escape from the coop and you have to round them up. They leave sticky little messes all over the yard. When it’s too cold, they die; too warm and they die. They smell, they're noisy and they attract predators.
There are obviously people with more spare time than me that keep chickens and they go on about the cuddly little chicks, the supply of fresh eggs and the roasting chickens in their freezer. In my opinion, these chickens aren’t far from free range chickens and they are really to tough to roast, generally a long boil makes them almost edible. Read comments above.
But there are ways to get them roasted – I read where one person’s coop caught fire -- a rogue heat lamp was the culprit -- and these chickens were roasted to a fine consistency. Imagine this happening in a dense urban neighborhood.
I know there are local supporters of the campaign to allow chickens in this city’s backyards. All across the United States, people are harboring illegal poultry in backyard coops hoping their city councils will revise the codes that ban them.
But I wonder if these people have thought this through? Chickens, if you don’t know, have issues.
Urban farming might be trendy now, but it’s still farming, and that means its hard work. The chicken-feeding at my grandparents’ farm started out as a lot of fun but it soon became drudgery. Being awakened by a rooster early in the morning soon loses its luster. Then there's the manure. A few chickens can produce a lot of manure and their coops require a lot of litter. Know what it smells like? I know grass is in disfavor these days, but do you really want a barnyard just off your deck? Go down to Sandy Beach Park early in the morning before city crews clean up the forty pounds of goose manure. More importantly, do your neighbors? Many people don’t even pickup their dog waste, cleaning up chicken manure is harder.
Then there's the noise. They don't just hang around looking like statues that peck at bugs all day. They can make as much noise as sled dogs. Add a rooster to the mix and you've got real trouble. Roosters don’t know the difference between sunrise and high noon. They'll crow all day if they feel like it.
I read where the Globe and Mail’s Gary Mason wondered how the business professional-by-day/chicken-owner-by-night was going to handle certain situations. Like when an egg gets stuck coming out. It happens, not infrequently. And when it does, you have to stick your hand in there and get it. It’s also not uncommon for a hen’s vents to collapse. A vent is the external opening at the bottom of the bird’s vaginal canal. To fix the problem, you’re supposed to moisten your fingers (hemorrhoid cream is the lubricant of choice) and move the vent back into place. I can see lots of people throughout the city just dying to snap on the rubber gloves to perform that little procedure.
Even worse will be when hens suddenly stop laying eggs or never produce them. Managing health problems can really vary because chickens are susceptible to all sorts of problems that result in high mortality rates.
“At first I named them but now I’ve stopped because it’s just too hard,” said Sharon Jones, who started with eight chickens in a coop fashioned from plywood and chicken wire in the front yard of her north Berkeley home. She’s down to three. [2]
It was noted that Ms. Jones’ little flock has been plagued by mysterious diseases. She was not taking them to the vet because of the high cost, but she goes to workshops and searches out cures on the Internet. She has even put garlic down their throats in hopes that the antibacterial qualities of the cloves might help. Meanwhile, her chickens die.
Others believe that the offices of veterinarians will be overrun with city folk having chicken problems. Urban dwellers and their children will undoubtedly become attached to these creatures. When the little birds are feeling under the weather, urban farmers will spend thousands to get the problem diagnosed. At least there’s some economic benefit.
Then there are the predators. Rats, cats, dogs, raccoons, skunks, coyotes, foxes -- all now attracted to your urban neighborhoods by easily attainable food. Your neighbors won't thank you for attracting these creatures.
At Kate Klaire’s house[3], the elementary school teacher has other problems. She has been through three different flocks in four years.
She ticks through a list of all the ways her chickens have died. There was the breakout of Marek’s disease. Her dog got to one chicken before some rules of the roost were laid down. She suspects a fox or a coyote carried off several when she was away.
More upsetting were the two she found with their necks broken. “I believe they were murdered,” she said, pointing to a chain link fence that appeared to have been bent by a human foot. Maybe I missed a predator.
I can handle the predators, but I hate rats. Rats love chicken feed. Attracting rats into the neighborhood means diseases that are deadly and rats can get pretty much anywhere you don’t want them. Rats carry the following diseases[4]:
Hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS) is a deadly disease transmitted by infected rodents through urine, droppings, or saliva. Humans can contract the disease when they breathe in aerosolized virus. HPS was first recognized in 1993 and has since been identified throughout the United States. Although rare, HPS is potentially deadly.
Murine typhus (caused by infection with R. typhi) occurs worldwide and is transmitted to humans by rat fleas. Flea-infested rats can be found throughout the year in humid tropical environments, but in temperate regions are most common during the warm summer months. Travelers who visit in rat-infested buildings and homes, especially in harbor or riverine environments, can be at risk for exposure to the agent of murine typhus.
Rat-bite fever (RBF) is a systemic bacterial illness caused by Streptobacillus moniliformis that can be acquired through the bite or scratch of a rodent or the ingestion of food or water contaminated with rat feces.
As its name suggests, it causes a typhoid-like disease in mice. In humans S. Typhimurium does not cause as severe disease as S. Typhi, and is not normally fatal. The disease is characterized by diarrhea, abdominal cramps, vomiting and nausea, and generally lasts up to 7 days. Unfortunately, in immunocompromized people, that is the elderly, young, or people with depressed immune systems, salmonella infections are often fatal if they are not treated with antibiotics.
Leptospirosis is a bacterial disease that affects humans and animals. It is caused by bacteria of the genus Leptospira. In humans it causes a wide range of symptoms, and some infected persons may have no symptoms at all. Symptoms of leptospirosis include high fever, severe headache, chills, muscle aches, and vomiting, and may include jaundice (yellow skin and eyes), red eyes, abdominal pain, diarrhea, or a rash. If the disease is not treated, the patient could develop kidney damage, meningitis (inflammation of the membrane around the brain and spinal cord), liver failure, and respiratory distress. In rare cases death occurs.
Eosinophilic meningitis is an infection of the brain occurring in association with an increase in the number of eosinophils, white blood cells that are associated with infection with worms that penetrate into the body. The organism most commonly causing eosinophilic meningitis is a rat lung worm called angiostrongylus cantonensis.
The bubonic plague is an infection of the lymphatic system, usually resulting from the bite of an infected flea, Xenopsylla cheopis (the rat flea). The fleas are often found on rodents, such as rats and mice, and seek out other prey when their rodent hosts die. The bacteria form aggregates in the gut of infected fleas and this results in the flea regurgitating ingested blood, which is now infected, into the bite site of a rodent or human host. Once established, bacteria rapidly spread to the lymph nodes and multiply. Y. pestis bacilli can resist phagocytosis and even reproduce inside phagocytes and kill them. As the disease progresses, the lymph nodes can haemorrhage and become swollen and necrotic. Bubonic plague can progress to lethal septicemic plague in some cases. The plague is also known to spread to the lungs and become the disease known as the pneumonic plague. This form of the disease is highly infectious as the bacteria can be transmitted in droplets emitted when coughing or sneezing.
I’m sure these diseases aren’t any problem in dense urban populations.
Chickens are no smarter than they need to be. When they get loose, you have to catch them. They can be pretty tough to catch in an urban environment. With any luck, they may eventually end up at the Humane Society.
Birds, as we have learned the last few years, can carry and spread disease at an alarming rate. Keeping them in confined spaces in densely populated areas is asking for trouble. They get diseases with odd names, like pasty butt and the fowl plague. The main concerns with chickens specifically are Salmonella and Campylobacter, which are both bacteria that cause diarrhea. They can be passed in the droppings of healthy chickens and can be on eggs. Common sense practices such as keeping the chickens away from areas where people eat (e.g. the backyard picnic table), proper handling of eggs and good general hygiene should reduce the risks greatly, as long as the number of chickens kept is small. Avian influenza (bird flu) is another concern, although currently it's not a major issue in North America. Anything that increases contact between birds and people can increase the risk of influenza transmission. If bird flu entered a particular region, urban chickens could be a big problem.
My personal favorite is the external parasite problem. I must confess that just thinking about mites and lice makes me start to itch. If you’re like me, I’d suggest not reading this just before it’s time for bed or you’ll be scratching all night long. Let’s start with where these external parasites come from and how to identify them.
[5]Mites and lice can be brought into your flock from wild birds such as sparrows, crows, etc. They can also be brought in on rodents looking for food. Finally, anytime your flock or one of your chickens is exposed to other birds, you increase your risk of an infestation. Sales, auctions, and poultry shows can be considered an opportunity for mite and lice transfer. Because they are able to live away from a host for a period, clothing, egg cartons, even your hands can carry the little critters.
There are several kinds of mites that could infest your flock;
Northern Fowl Mites are a common external parasite found in poultry. They are usually found in the cool months of spring and fall, and in the winter. They live in temperate regions of the world and suck blood from varying types of fowl.
They are aggressive and primarily live on the chicken although they can survive off of the host bird for up to three weeks. They feed both day and night.
Identification is important. Northern Fowl Mites are very small and a reddish brown color deepening to almost black. They have 8 legs. The vent area is the most common site of infestation. Males tend to have a more scattered infestation. The eggs and waste of the mite will give the vent area an appearance of being dusty or dirty.
The Tropical Fowl Mite is comparable to the Northern Fowl Mite but lives in tropical regions.
The Chicken Mite (or Red Roost Mite) is another very common external parasite found in poultry. They are primarily a warm weather pest. They live in nest boxes, bedding material and on the skin of the birds.
Unlike Northern Fowl Mites, Chicken Mites tend to be nocturnal, sucking the blood of the flock while they sleep. During the day they hide in the cracks and crevices of the coop. Chicken Mites are very small and are a yellowish gray color but they become darker as they feed.
The above forms of mites suck blood and cannot be left untreated. The life cycle of mites can be as little as 10 days, which allows for a quick turnover and heavy infestation. Early intervention is necessary to prevent illness, debilitation and/or death within your flock.
Because Chicken Mites do not live on the birds, treatment of the coop is the most effective method. Treatment should be directed at the cracks and crevices within the coop where the mites hide during the day. Northern Fowl Mites require treatment to be directed at the birds themselves.
There are many products available to rid your flock of mites. Most contain pesticides, although I understand that there may be some organic treatments available as well. Contact your local veterinarian, feed store or agriculture center for recommendations and products available in your area.
Scaly Leg Mites are also a concern.
You will see skin that looks aged, swollen or deformed on your chicken’s legs and feet. These round, tiny, flat-bodied mites burrow under the skin, lifting the scales. If left untreated, the bird could become crippled.
Treat Scaly Leg Mites two to three times a week for a few weeks by dipping the infested bird’s legs in linseed oil. Wipe the legs clean and coat with petroleum jelly. Treatment may come to an end when skin is smooth again.
Poultry Lice are another concern for those keeping chickens.
Each region will have a most common strain and it’s not possible to address all the variations. There are some things all lice have in common though; they are all small wingless insects. They have 6 legs, are flat-bodied and have a broad, round head. They have chewing mouth parts, unlike the sucking mouth parts found in mites.
A louse spends its entire life on the host bird. You can see it as it moves on the skin by parting the feathers. Lice are most often found around the vent, at the head and under the wings. They do not suck blood but rather feed on feathers and dry skin scales. Although not as intrusive as mites, lice are irritating to a chicken.
Flocks that are infested with mites or lice show similar symptoms. Expect to see a decrease in food intake, a decrease in weight gain, a decrease in egg production and in increase in disease susceptibility.
If any of these general symptoms are present, you should thoroughly inspect your flock. If you suspect Chicken Mites, include a night time inspection when they are active. Poultry mites and lice are not dangerous to people. They can and may bite you, causing irritation but they cannot survive with a human host and are not a threat to people.
Prevention of mite and lice infestations is difficult. But some steps can be taken to reduce the chances of an infestation within your flock;
The best way to control these pests is early detection. Regularly inspect your flock. If you can catch an infestation early on, treatment and elimination can take place before harm is done.
Sanitation is of utmost importance as well. Keep the coop and bedding clean and fresh. Regularly scrub nesting boxes and other surfaces with soap and water. Disinfect the coop between flocks if that is an option.
Keep wild birds and rodents out of the coop and away from your chickens as much as possible. Wire mesh buried below the flooring is a great way to prevent tunneling rodents. Prevent wild birds from building nests in the immediate vicinity of your coop or run.
Finally, remember when introducing new birds into an existing flock, always quarantine new birds for 30 days before they have any contact with your flock. This applies to birds that have been away from your home and exposed to other birds, even other types of fowl.
If you’re planning on letting people raise urban chickens, do your homework. Do more than you think is necessary. There are plenty of skilled urban farmers willing to help people learn about chicken issues, and you should listen to them. I recently read this claim:
“the average person cannot be trusted to treat animals well. They aren’t equipped with the proper knowledge. Just consider how many small animals purchased from pet stores die within a few months after purchase.”
A few people told me it was ridiculous. They claimed that backyard hens were the perfect solution to cruel egg production in factory farming. And they argued that people would learn how to properly care for chickens.
Please.
Human beings can’t even properly care for cats and dogs on a regular basis, KILLING MILLIONS of them every year.[6]
An author, Kim Severson, has characterized the backyard chicken craze as a fad, like the potbellied pigs of a decade ago. Like any fad, many people jump in head first without acknowledging the risk, commitment, or education and skill involved. Severson points out that a lack of attention to these issues by unprepared and inexperienced owners–as well as the unavoidably strange and unique biological climates that urban and suburban areas contain–often lead to some bumps in the road. San Francisco is a case where new diseases and other persistent health problems have emerged, and many unprepared chicken owners have begun abandoning their hens and roosters at animal shelters.
For some animal rights workers, the backyard chicken trend is as bad as the pot-bellied pig craze in the 1980s or puppy fever set off by the movie “101 Dalmatians.” In both cases, the pets proved more difficult to care for than many owners suspected.
“It’s a fad,” said Susie Coston, national shelter director for Farm Sanctuary, which rescues animals and sends them to live on farms in New York and California. “People are going to want it for a while and then not be so interested.”
She said that farm animal rescue groups field about 150 calls a month for birds, most of them involving chickens — especially roosters.
“We’re all inundated right now with roosters,” she said. “They dump them because they think they are getting hens and they’re not.”
Some chicken owners buy from large hatcheries, which determine the sex of the birds and kill large numbers of baby roosters, because most people want laying hens. But sexing a chicken is an inexact science. Sometimes backyard farmers end up with a rooster, which are illegal in most cities.
Others believe that chickens are the THIN EDGE OF THE WEDGE. There are lots of other animals that could sneak into your city neighborhood soon. Goats, for example, don't take up much space and can provide milk as well as cut the grass. Llamas produce wonderful fiber for knitters and spinners as do sheep. According to no less an authority than the New York Times, the next big thing in urban agriculture is beekeeping.
[1] www.wormsandgermsblog.com
[2] http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/23/dining/23sfdine.html
[3] http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/23/dining/23sfdine.html
[4] http://www.aaanimalcontrol.com/ratdiseases.htm
[5] http://www.chickenkeepingsecrets.com/chicken-health/chicken-mites-lice-prevention-remedies/
[6] http://www.vegansoapbox.com/unwanted-urban-chickens/