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Your local zoning board might object. I live in PA, and one of the neighborhood vigilantes immediately ratted me out to the local government when I started grow
by EddieDante 4y ago
Your local zoning board might object. I live in PA, and one of the neighborhood vigilantes immediately ratted me out to the local government when I started growing corn, squash, and beans in my backyard while raising a couple of chickens for eggs.
- Johnny555 4y agoDid she object to the chickens or the garden? I suspect just the chickens, rather than your back yard garden.
- EddieDante 4y agoShe griped about both, the zoning board demanded I get rid of the chickens. I was tempted to leave their corpses on her doorstep and egg the municipal building as a petty sort of revenge, but that would have been too obvious. Those chickens were good eating, though, especially with some homegrown corn on the cob and baked beans. The squash didn't work out so well, unfortunately.
- skeeter2020 4y ago
- Tao332 4y ago
- gcheong 4y agoWhat was she griping about with the garden? Chickens I can understand if there are smell complaints. In San Francisco you are allowed to keep them but there are rules about the number you can have and the minimum distance their enclosure can be to any neighbors window, etc. But squash? That’s really an odd thing to complain about.
- toolz 4y agobackyard chickens don't have a smell, that's only once you start mass producing them in a factory. The same way yours or your neighbors dogs, that produce substantially more feces than a chicken, don't cause neighborhood wide odor.
- Johnny555 4y agoMy biggest problem with my neighbor's chickens was that they kept getting out an coming over to my property and he'd have to ask me to let him in the back yard so he could take them back home. Never noticed any smells near their coop which was near the property line. Never really bothered me since they mostly just hung out around the back fence far from my house, but finally another neighbor complained to the city and they had to get rid of the chickens. Chickens are allowed here (up to 10 per property), but have to be kept confined and on your own property.
- gcheong 4y agoI was probably just interpreting the ordinance requirements of a minimum distance of 20 feet from any neighbor’s door or window as having to do with smell when I read it.
- dboreham 4y agoThe ones my neighbor keeps smell terrible. Perhaps he doesn't clean their enclosure though.
- Tao332 4y agoObviously regulations vary across counties and municipalities, but when/where I lived in PA, the zoning rules spelled it out pretty clearly that hens were fine but roosters weren't.
- ceejayoz 4y agoIt also takes well over an acre to support a single person, and that's if you know what you're doing and have the time to manage a garden of that size.
- Johnny555 4y agoYou don't have to grow 100% of your food to benefit from a home garden.
- ceejayoz 4y agoSure, but "the coming food catastrophe" implies something more than "I grow some tomatoes in a corner of my yard" as a necessary response. A garden is great, but it's not gonna solve a global food crisis.
- Johnny555 4y agoThe post you're replying to suggests a Victory Garden. While a personal victory garden may not have a big effect on global food supplies, it can absolutely help supplement food for households that are squeezed by higher food prices (which is another side effect of global food shortages). Victory gardens, also called war gardens or food gardens for defense, were vegetable, fruit, and herb gardens planted at private residences and public parks in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and Germany during World War I and World War II. In wartime, governments encouraged people to plant victory gardens not only to supplement their rations but also to boost morale. They were used along with rationing stamps and cards to reduce pressure on the public food supply.
- Scoundreller 4y agoThat’s why I grow for value and flavour. Base calories are cheap, making them taste good (in a healthy way) costs a lot more.
- EddieDante 4y agoI just wanted to look out my window and see something more useful than grass, OK? If I got to enjoy a couple meals out of what I grew, so much the better.
- barbazoo 4y agoWhat an outdated policy but I've heard of that happening here too, Stratas not allowing people to use their outdoor space to grow any kind of food.
- Scoundreller 4y agoAt least the FCC protects your ability to put up a satellite dish (and “An antenna that is designed to receive local television broadcast signals.”) If they hated my garden and chickens, they’re really gonna hate my 40’ Rohn and guidewires!
- ncpa-cpl 4y ago> 40' Is it for shortwave or ham radio?
- JaimeThompson 4y agoIf they can't have chickens pigs are totally out. I'm sorry
- bell-cot 4y agoQuite true, and the potential for gardening is quite situational. OTOH, current forecasts of mega-scale hunger, famines, & death look pretty useful, if you wanted to paint such, ah, busybodies, in a rather negative light, and try to get some rules changed.
- skeeter2020 4y agoGrowing a garden and raising livestock are pretty different in practice & impact from my experience. Assuming you voluntarily moved into the zoning and "Karen" objected to you violating them, it's all on you.
- EddieDante 4y agoThe zoning change came after I moved in and after I got my chickens. If I had the time, money, and inclination I might have been able to find a lawyer willing to appeal on ex post facto[0] grounds, but it wasn't a battle worth fighting. I had had a year's worth of free eggs by then, and the chickens themselves didn't go to waste. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ex_post_facto_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ex_post_facto_law
- dang 4y ago> one of the neighborhood Karens Please keep that sort of slur off HN. We don't need it here, and you don't need it to make your substantive points.
- BigBubbleButt 4y agoI don't know if the comment was edited or not, but I hope you're not claiming "vigilante" is a slur. I looked up the definition of slur just to be sure and you are technically correct, but I'd say you're abusing language far more than the person you're responding to.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- jasonlotito 4y agoAlso, that's the user dang. He pretty much runs HN. I'd assume anything he says in these regards as fact and trust him.
- dang 4y agoI certainly hope not. People need to push back when we get things wrong. Luckily for me they are not shy about doing so.
- kiawe_fire 4y agoThis comment is what leadership looks like.
- dang 4y agoIt said "Karen" and the commenter edited it. Edit: I've added the context back by quoting what the GP originally said. I guess one good passive-aggressive stealth edit deserves another.
- Tao332 4y ago
- yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago> one of the neighborhood vigilantes immediately ratted me out to the local government Better than your previous phrasing, but try again; if the action that they took was to report you to the government then they are the opposite of a vigilante by definition.
- corrral 4y agoThe original word (which: I can't keep up, is that really bad now? When did that happen, last week?) made more sense, really. "Vigilante" is way off from it.
- filoeleven 4y agoIt was always a bad shorthand. The word you are after is “busybody,” perhaps with some preceding adjectives to indicate malicious intent.
- komadori 4y agoI don't think it's right to co-opt and despoil that name of doubtless many real people, so if there is a pushback against using "Karen" as an insult then I'm in favour of it. That said, this is first time I've seen anyone else say anything against it. Perhaps I also can't keep up? ;-)
- corrral 4y agoYeah, I'm not, like, put out by that one becoming verboten, I'm just surprised at the sudden change.