Holly Kim of central Lake County and Ed Fuhrmann of Round Lake Beach think raising chickens in back yards of municipalities should be legal. (Sheryl DeVore/Tribune)
Watermelon clucks softly as Holly Kim removes the chicken from its pen. She hands one to daughter, Kelly, 7, who gently strokes it. Daughter Wendy, 6, feeds Watermelon some Queen Anne?s lace leaves, while son Malachi, 3, watches from his swing.
They love their two chickens, Watermelon and Bully. But if the central Lake County municipality in which the family lives knew about the chickens, the animals would have to go.
The Kims, of Round Lake Beach, raise chickens ?underground.? And they?re not alone in Lake County. There has been growing interest in recent years to raise back yard chickens ? even in areas where zoning does not allow it.
People do it for the eggs, or as a way to rebel against the conditions on large commercial farms. Some just like chickens. Others say it makes sense in a tough economy.
?I know of at least four in Lake Forest and three in Grayslake,? said Round Lake Beach resident Ed Fuhrmann.
Related story and videos: Down on the farm with chickens.
Fuhrmann supports the raising of chickens in Lake County back yards. So he?s taking on one Lake County municipality at a time to reverse the local ordinances that forbid the practice.
He?s started with the four Round Lake municipalities and the village of Hainesville, sending letters to board members and calling village officials to ask them to consider changing their ordinances.
Fuhrmann has also scheduled a free information forum on the issue for 2 p.m., Sept. 17, at the Robert W. Rolek Community Center, 814 Hart Road in Round Lake.
He has a Facebook page for the Round Lake Area CLUCK (Chicago Land Urban Chicken Keepers) and keeps in touch with McHenry chicken proponents as well.
Ordinances vary, but most Lake County towns don?t allow farm-raised animals like chickens, though pot-bellied pigs are legal as pets in some towns. Sharon Gaughan, an education program director at the Prairie Crossing Learning Farm in Grayslake, said she asked Wildwood officials if she could raise chickens in her yard. They told her only if she had at least several acres. A neighbor raises chickens anyway, she said.
A core group of about a dozen Lake County residents are helping Fuhrmann with the movement in Lake County, he said, which has become a trend nationwide. Chicago allows backyard chickens. Evanston and the Milwaukee officials just voted to allow them, though Crystal Lake officials, in a close vote, chose not to allow chickens in their town.
Fuhrmann said he?s received cold to lukewarm receptions at best from municipalities. But he?s not going to be the proverbial chicken running around with his head cut off.
?I?m taking this slow and steady,? he said. ?We are in this for the long haul.?
Round Lake Beach village administrator David Kilbane said he knows of no plans to have formal discussions on the topic.
Furhmann does not harbor chickens in his back yard himself, and has never raised them. But the electronics teacher at the Great Lakes Naval Station grows fruits and vegetables in his back yard, and believes in the locally grown food movement. Raising chickens is part of that philosophy, he said.
He?s been around urban chickens since he was a kid, growing up in Chicago.
?We had friends and neighbors with chickens, so it was all a very normal part of city life,? he said. ?Much of our yard was devoted to growing food under the watchful eye of my grandmother who helped her family survive in lean teams in World War II Yugoslavia by what she could coax out of the ground and obtain from the few animals they were allowed to keep.?
Kim, too, grows much of her own vegetables ? she doesn?t buy any at the store in summer. She also belongs to a coalition of urban homesteaders.
?We believe in sustaining the land,? Kim said.
Fuhrmann cites several reasons for raising chickens and growing vegetables and fruits in yards is a 21st century model that needs to be embraced: Freshly laid eggs and homegrown vegetables taste better than those bought in the store. Chickens in the back yard are treated more ethically than those raised for mass production of food. People need a better understanding of where their food is coming from.
?The mass production of food concept isn?t working anymore,? he said. And in these economic times ? some folks might need to grow their own vegetables and raise their own chickens, he added.
Chickens make good pets, added Fuhrmann.
?They are kid magnets,? he said.
He wonders why it?s O.K. for people to have dogs and cats as pets, but not chickens.
?In Round Lake Beach, I can have three 50-pound barking dogs next door, but I can?t have three 5-pound chickens.?
Holly Kim said she considers her chickens as pets and she?s waiting for her hens to lay eggs. She received the hens when they were chicks from a local school that worked with a University of Illinois Extension program in Lake County.
Under a teacher?s guidance, youngsters care for eggs in incubators and watch the chicks hatch, then donate them to local residents who want to raise them. The extension, based in Grayslake, doesn?t check on whether the chick recipients are legal chicken farmers.
Erin Cummisford, program associate for Prairie Crossing Learning Farm in Grayslake, works with volunteers ? children and adults ? who collect, wash and package eggs at a chicken farm of 140 hens.
?A lot of people don?t know where eggs come from or think about it. Most people don?t have the opportunity to interact with chickens. Children and adults get a deeper connection with their source of food, when volunteering at the farm,? she said.
?We?re all for people raising chickens in their back yards, as long as ordinances are followed,? Gaughan said.
A farm is one thing, but back yard chicken raising does have its drawbacks, said James Reaves, Lake and McHenry County Director for University of Illinois Extension.
?It depends. Some of those roosters are pretty loud. It depends how far you are away from a neighbor?s house. I like good eggs and I?m a country boy. But it just depends on a lot of scenarios,? he said.
That?s why Fuhrmann said ordinances to allow chickens need to stipulate that only hens and not roosters should be allowed.
?Hens are quiet,? he said. ?You don?t even know they?re there.?
Bob Elkins cautiously supports Fuhrmann. Elkins used to keep chickens, as well as goats and other animals, on his 5-acre farm in unincorporated McHenry County. Now he lives in Round Lake Beach, and grows his own fruit and vegetables. He?d love to have chickens, too, he said.
?It takes a lot of work to care for them,? he said. ?It?s great to have them running in your yard, but you have to be careful? not to disturb the neighbors, he said.
Kim said her neighbors love her chickens.
Elkins said chicken raisers also need to be aware of predators ? in McHenry County, weasels and raccoons sometimes took his chickens, he said.
He also speculates that you?re not going to save money by raising your own chickens.
Furhmann has developed a model ordinance to prevent problems ? including a limit on the number of chickens to be kept, and how they are to be kept. He?s willing to share it with any municipality who wants to learn more.
Crystal Lake Mayor Aaron Shepley cast the deciding vote that maintained a no-chicken ordinance in his town. He said he worried about property values declining and that hens might attract unwanted pests.
Fuhrmann doesn?t buy that.
People who feed birds or put the food for their dogs and cats outdoors attract predatory animals and rodents already, he argues. Chickens kept properly would not create that problem, he said.
Source: http://triblocal.com/round-lake/2011/09/05/residents-want-backyard-chickens-legal-in-county/
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