At first glance, the backyard in an upscale 1950s Toronto development seems to be typically Canadian. There's a barbecue, patio furniture, a well-kept lawn – and then there are the chickens.
Two hens peck at the grass, while a third broody one sits in the nest. With people in the yard, the curious chickens move toward the orange fencing of the run, their soft cooing barely audible over the hum of neighbours' air conditioners.
Their owner, a middle-aged woman wearing jeans and a black T-shirt with a stylish haircut and funky glasses – who wouldn't give her name for fear of being discovered by city officials – says she is one of about a half-dozen people in Toronto she knows of who secretly keeps chickens on their properties.
“It covers absolutely every type of person,” she says. “Young, old, every ethnic group.”
In cities and towns across the country, people are keeping chickens on the sly, in their backyards. Most Canadian municipalities don't allow for poultry within city limits, so otherwise law-abiding citizens are breaking the rules to keep their own hens. Their motivation? They want to connect with the origins of their food – and the taste of a backyard egg, they say, beats anything you can buy at the grocery store.
The movement is quickly gaining momentum. There are numerous blogs, message boards and e-mail groups where aficionados trade tips on how to build a raccoon-proof coop, corral the chickens at night and how to best store eggs. And wannabe urban chicken farmers are looking to the few Canadian cities like Niagara Falls, Ont.; Guelph, Ont.; Brampton, Ont., and Victoria, where backyard flocks are deemed okay, as they force the issue in their own municipalities.
In small towns and big cities alike, citizens are pressing city council to change the rules. Earlier this year, Vancouver's city council voted unanimously to ask staff to write a new bylaw, which has yet to be passed. In the Southern Ontario city of Owen Sound, councillor David Adair says he will bring forward a motion in August to allow laying hens in town. A group called the Waterloo Hen Association has persuaded the city of Waterloo, Ont., to allow about a dozen families to continue to raise hens until the city votes in the future. And in Toronto, city officials are studying the issue.
Citizens in other cities have been less successful. Halifax decided last year to forbid chickens after a debate. And in Kamloops, council has similarly turned down two proposals from the public asking for a bylaw change.
Bonnie Klohn, a resident of Kamloops, B.C., who has been leading the fight for legalization, says the underground chicken movement is so strong that in her city alone – where people risk a $100 fine and an order to immediately dispense of the birds if caught – there are more than 200 families with hens. She says she has also been contacted by people in cities like Ottawa, Halifax, Charlottetown and Calgary, asking for tips on how to fight the local government.
“My hunch would be that they are hen-keepers,” she says.
In Surrey, B.C., Heather Jarvey has two contraband chickens in a hen house with an adjacent run she built with her husband in the yard. While the city does permit fowl if the homeowner's lot spans at least an acre, hers is not big enough and thus, her chickens are illegal.
“It would have to be almost 10 times as big,” she says of her lot. “I don't like it. I don't want to have to [break the law].”
But it is worth it, she says. The chickens, two different heritage-breed birds, are like pets.
