The District of North Vancouver is set to vote Monday night on whether residents can keep backyard chickens.
The bylaw, should it pass, comes with a fair bit of red tape on coop size and what you can and can’t do with a dead chicken.
But critics have been quick to point out the obvious. Chicken coops could attract predators and scavengers, especially the large and furry kind likely to view a coop as more of a pic-a-nic basket.
But what came first? The chicken bylaw or the bear problem? If we really want to get serious about keeping bears out of residential neighbourhoods, we should start throwing the book at the many North Vancouverites who refuse to comply with the existing bylaws about garbage disposal and picking ripe fruit meant to keep bear attractants out of yards.
There are no bans in place on beekeeping, birdfeeders, barbecues, citronella candles or backyard hot tub covers – all of which are apparently delicious-smelling to black bears.
The cost of running a chicken coop is surely going to be more than a trip to even the ritziest organic grocery store. But there is an intrinsic value to having your own source of food growing next to your home.
And the beauty of our system is that a bylaw, if it turns out to be a rotten egg, can be repealed.
So we say stop balking and take a crack at it. You can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs.
If there is trouble at the henhouse and the chickens come home to roost, we’ll cross that road when we come to it.
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