Cockerels Crowing

Keeping cockerels in the urban environment is highly likely to disturb those residents living close by.

If you are disturbed by a Cockerel

• first, try to discuss your concerns the owner, they may not realise the cockerel is disturbing you
• if you feel unable to approach them directly try writing a polite letter, remember to keep a copy

Making a complaint to Environmental Health

Noise complaint form

When completing the online form you will need to provide the following

• details of where the noise is coming from, the house number and street address
• what time is the noise happening, e.g. early in the morning
• your name, address and contact telephone number

We will write to the address where the noise is happening and let them know we have had a complaint. We will also ask you to fill in log sheets with the dates and the times of when the noise is occurring. This helps us decide if it is a statutory nuisance.

Environmental Health only take action where they are satisfied a statutory nuisance exists. 'Statutory nuisance' is defined by case law and not easy to describe.

Action we can take

If from your logs sheets it shows there may be a Statutory Nuisance then we will look at taking further action. This could be putting noise recording equipment in or an officer making a visiting to witness the noise and assess if the noise constitutes a nuisance.

If a nuisance is confirmed, we will serve a Noise Abatement Notice preventing further noise nuisance. Failure to comply with a Noise Abatement Notice is a criminal offence.

Keeping cockerels

• as far as practicable from neighbouring residential property
• keep cockerels in a dark coop at night and don't let cockerels out of the darkened coop until a reasonable hour
• you don't need cockerels for your chickens to produce eggs, it is also a mistaken belief that chickens lay better when there is a cockerel around

If, after trying all the above suggestions, your neighbours are still being disturbed, consider re-homing the cockerel. There are a number of animal sanctuaries that are willing to accept cockerels.