Raise the Hammer

GUELPH — There are few cities in southern Ontario that allow residents to keep exotic pets, especially livestock, in their own backyards, but Guelph is an exception. City bylaws permit residents to keep chickens, goats, and other animals so long as they meet certain regulations.

Eight years ago, when Rachel Farahbakhsh and her husband first arrived in Guelph, they picked up a dozen chickens at a general store at the suggestion of the shopkeeper. Since then, she and her family have been slowly expanding their backyard farm to include veggies, fruit trees and goats. Her most recent project is building a greenhouse so they can grow crops all year around.

Currently, she has five hens that are kept in a wire pen and sleep in a small coop made of straw and mud. The coop’s walls are thick enough to keep the birds warm, even throughout the winter, and in return for their happy home, the chickens provide eggs for her family.

She also has fruit trees throughout the yard, surrounding a large garden.. Add her four goats to the mix and the residential backyard begins to resemble a small farmyard.

Farahbakhsh sees the goats as pets that also provide her family with milk. On average, she gets two litres a day from a goat when it’s producing. She said when the goat gave birth to its two kids, the spectacle became a neighbourhood celebration. Everyone wanted to stop by and see the baby animals.

“We’re really fortunate in Guelph, there’s no question,” she said, adding she knows many others who are building their own backyard farms within the city. “You would never know from the front what’s going on in the backyard.”

Paul Moore, the city’s manager of permits and zoning, is someone whose job requires him to know what goes on in residential backyards, to a certain degree. He said goats used for agricultural purposes are not allowed to be kept in the residential sections of Guelph, unless of course, they are pets.

Moore said it is uncommon for people to have goats as pets, but it does happen from time to time. Goats are in the same class as other agricultural livestock such as cattle, pigs and sheep.

The line dividing whether one can own this type of animal in a residential area is a little blurry. Ultimately, it depends on what the animal is used for. If it is used to harvest milk or other materials that will be sold at a market, the animal would need to be kept in an agricultural zone. If the animal if kept for companionship, it may be allowed in a residential zone. He said as far as the zoning bylaw goes, “it’s tough to determine” whether someone owns these animals for agricultural purposes.

“If somebody was to have a goat or so in the city as pets, I think we’d be hard pressed to go after them as being agricultural livestock based, according to our definition,” he said. If that goat makes too much noise, however, there are noise bylaws that will address this.

As for chickens, the City of Guelph bylaw number (1985)-11952 allows residents to keep pigeons, geese or poultry in their yard, so long as they are kept in pens with floors and are at least 15.3 metres away from neighbours’ houses.

http://www.guelphmercury.com/news/local/article/745468--urban-farms-take-root-in-guelph