Silicon Valley Residents Try Their Hand at Raising Backyard Chickens

By Dana Hull, San Jose Mercury News

07/20/2009 05:37:38 AM

Santa Clara Vice Mayor Jamie Matthews doesn't fancy himself as a trendy guy. He's 48, has four kids and his day job is working as a code enforcement administrator for the city of San Jose.

But Matthews has three chickens — hens, to be exact — in his backyard. And that puts him squarely in the middle of the latest fad for some intrepid urban and suburban gardeners: raising backyard chickens.

"It's a labor of love," said Matthews, who gives eggs to his neighbors and has named his three hens Star, Lucy and Ethel. "There's a tremendous difference in quality. The yolks of our eggs are larger and more vibrant than ones you buy at a grocery store, and they are very, very tasty. You don't need salt and pepper."

There's no California chicken census. Accurate statistics on how many chickens are pecking around Bay Area backyards are impossible to come by because many cities allow households to keep a small number of chickens without permits. In San Jose, you can keep six chickens or fewer without a permit; in Santa Clara, it's four or fewer.

But anecdotal information suggests many people are taking the poultry plunge. Seattle sponsors a popular City Chickens Coop Tour. There are blogs galore, with names like The Daily Coop, Urban Chicken Underground, and Now and Hen. And Redwood City resident Thomas Kriese twitters about it @urbanchickens.

In Palo Alto, 20 people have city chicken permits, which cost $15 and are renewed every year. Palo Alto allows a maximum of six hens per household but bans roosters because of noise. The city also requires that the hens be secured in a coop at night so they are safe from predators like raccoons. Neighbors, who in the past have lodged noise complaints, must also grant permission.

"Most of the chicken owners in Palo Alto are families with young kids," said Fran Law, the city's lead animal control officer. "They are into healthy eating. They give flax seeds to the chickens so they can get more Omega-3 fatty acids in the eggs.

"It's kind of a yuppie thing. Usually Dad gets recruited to build the coop," said Law, who keeps her own chicken flock at her house in Half Moon Bay. "The mom researches chickens to death and really raises them."

Redwood City residents Susan and Garrett Alley started talking seriously about chickens in November, when California voters passed Proposition 2, an animal rights law that requires farmers to provide livestock, including chickens, more room in their cages.

"When I started learning about how most chickens are raised, we realized we could raise our own and know exactly how they are treated," said Susan Alley. "We got them in January, and we got our first egg on Memorial Day."

Her two daughters — Millen, 9, and Leigh, 7 — have added cleaning out the bottom of the chicken coop to their list of chores and love retrieving freshly laid eggs. The three Barred Rock hens — Mohawk, Mathilda and Cheepers — are fast supplanting the cat as favorite pets. The first daughter up in the morning goes out to feed them.

"They eat a ton, mostly plants and bugs," Millen said. "But they also love popcorn."

San Carlos resident Jeff Nachmann, who has tomatoes and corn growing in his garden, is in the process of leaping to chickens. He got inspired this past spring, when his daughter, who was in kindergarten, talked excitedly about the baby chicks hatched in her classroom.

"We have friends in San Mateo who have chickens, and they are really fun to watch," said Nachmann, who built a coop from a design he found on the Internet. "They are not really pets, but they are entertaining."

Oakland author Novella Carpenter warns in her recently published memoir "Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer," that "chickens are the gateway animal for urban farming." Carpenter's book chronicles her relationships with a menagerie that started with chickens and quickly expanded to included turkeys, rabbits and eventually two pigs — all in urban Oakland.

The Alley family is already thinking about the next step.

"The next animal to get would be a goat," said Susan Alley. "It would be great to be able to get your own goat milk and make cheese."

Her husband reminded her that Redwood City doesn't allow goats.

"Bees. Maybe we could do bees," he said. "I've heard that bees are becoming as popular as chickens.