Posted on 07/17/2010 5:05:34 PM PDT by JoeProBono
PETOSKEY, Mich.- A northern Michigan woman has lost a long legal battle to keep her disabled pet rooster in a suburban neighborhood.
Beaker, who suffered permanent injury when he was dropped at the age of 3 days by students at a Montessori kindergarten, will have to move to the Second Chance Animal Ranch in Petoskey, Mich., The Detroit News reported Saturday. But Sharon Peters worries about her pet's future, since he can barely see, has a club foot, and is frightened of other chickens but is comfortable with her and her husband.
"We're his flock, basically," she told the News.
Peters, who teaches at the Montessori school, brought Beaker home in 2007.
"I have sucker written across my forehead," she said.
A neighbor complained a year later about Beaker's crowing. Peters fought to keep him before the zoning board, the county commission and two courts, until a circuit judge ruled the rooster had to go.
Emmet County, at the tip of Michigan's lower peninsula, has an ordinance barring farm animals on residential property.
The Peters picked up both allies and enemies during the fight. Some neighbors bought T-shiris saying "I'm a Beaker Backer" and others sent them anonymous threats.
Looks like dinner to me. That baby thinks so too.
We walk across the road to see them. She's been warned about "cow licks".
Wow, the noise, it must have been deafening.
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Yeah. Cows are deafening! And the crickets and peepers! ;-)
Oh now that’s just a really mean thing to do to a hungry person! LOL
No tolerance for odd pets? I don’t think that is it. It’s the crowing before daylight. We don’t get up early and don’t want to be awakened before dawn by a rooster next door outside our bedroom window.
My neighbors don’t want to be disturbed by my dogs at night when they are trying to sleep so I am careful to keep my dogs quiet. City people are forced to live close together and we must put up with a lot but a crowing rooster before dawn is asking too much.
Really kind of a strange thing to hear the complaining coming from Petoskey. It isn’t exactly a metropolis. Wildlife probably makes more noise than a single chicken.
It looks like it might have been a farming community. I’d say they have to be really light sleepers or the rooster very close for it to bother them. We have a rooster down the road. The only noise that gets to me is the coyotes when they are circling another animal to attack. Sometimes you hear it screaming too.
I wake up to the sound of sandhill cranes and geese most mornings.
If I were the rooster owner, I’d be tempted to get a donkey and give the neighbors something to whine about.
The Bremen Town musicians? ;-)
A donkey can definitely sing. You can hear those for miles.
I’ve never heard a donkey. There’s an animal farm near me that rents animals to movies and for commercials. They had a lion years ago. It was freaky to hear it scream at night.
Looks like the kid is holding a barred rock hen, not a rooster.
Just sayin...
I will bet no one else on Free Republic has tried to find a chicken pecker...LOL sorry to those I have offended...
I lived in Hawaii for many years and always heard roosters crowing. I love the sound. Many people kept chickens even in small backyards.
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