Re: “At this point, Nelson not able to welcome chickens and bees,” Letters, January 30
With all due respect to Mr. MacHutchon, his credentials and his letter to the Star, I had a flock of 25 to 35 chickens in Harrop-Procter for 10 years. In that time there were cougars and bears on the property and relatively near my coop and free ranging chickens.
There was no electrified fence around my coop (there were however many coils of barbed wire around the place where a former owner had kept his bee hives). In that entire time the only predation of my chickens was by a skunk. I also had nine chickens at Bealby Point, with bears around on several occasions, with no predation.
I certainly agree that unsecured feed, compost that is not properly active, fruit left on trees or the ground and food waste left out in garbage are irresponsible and much more of an issue.
It makes more (although little) sense to proscribe composting because the city does not have the resources to police our compost piles, than it does to forbid or highly regulate the keeping of chickens, putting more stress on city resources.
There is also more general education required around being clear with wild creatures about our territory so that they don’t attempt to “move in.”
Perhaps if we were less Canadian about politely mentioning to each other our concerns regarding attracting wildlife, but also made more time to help each other out and sought help when we had a misunderstanding (e.g. the Nelson Good Neighbours Program), we would not be placing such a burden on local government. Cities are sandwiched between aging infrastructure, citizenry with high expectations and downloading from other levels of government.
Andre C. Piver MD
Nelson