Last week I had some fun with THIS POST letting you know where your dogs are legally allowed (and not allowed) to poop in the city, and it ignited a firestorm of comments on our Facebook Page. Some were from people happy to know the actual rules around it, others from the non-dog-loving set.
What I learned from the response is that you people care about pets, so I was pretty excited to see THIS SEGMENT by Shane Foxman on CBC about a lady in Burnaby who is keeping pygmy goats on her property despite it breaking the bylaw there.
Goats on a roof in Burnaby. Photo: CBC
She got a petition together with 400 signatures from her neighbours and brought it to Burnaby City Hall, convincing them to do a review to possibly amend the bylaw and let people keep pygmy goats. Meanwhile she gets to keep Toddy and Andy on her property.
I did a bit of digging because I wanted to let you know the rules around these types of animals in the City of Vancouver, and I confirmed a couple of things I already knew: Yes you're ALLOWED to keep 4 chickens on your property but there's a hard line that's drawn between them and any other barnyard beasts. Section 7.2 of the Animal Control Bylaw (which you can wade through in its entirety HERE) makes it clear:
7.2 A person must not keep in any area, temporarily or permanently, any horses, donkeys,
cattle, swine, sheep, goats, ducks, geese, turkeys, pheasants, quail, or other poultry or fowl
My understanding of the origin of this section of the bylaw is that it came from concerns about disease spreading, neighbourhoods reeking it up because of manure, and general noise complaints. But while this rule is hard and fast right now the decision that Burnaby makes could set a precedent for surrounding municipalities, bringing wave of change. Who knows, maybe THIS APRIL FOOLS JOKE that the Courier pulled off in 2009 about Mayor Gregor hiring a goat to maintain the grounds of city hall might not be too far from reality in the future.
