Probably those who live in the city don’t really understand about grass always being green over the septic tank. The tank is connected to a leach field. If the leach field gets plugged and the evaporation process is slowed, forcing water and waste up out of the ground.
Well, it makes for very deep lush green grass and a multitude of insects that reside in the area, which is a magnet for chickens. Obviously not healthy but this was one of my experiences.
My Neighbor’s Septic
I had the chickens before all but one neighbor moved in.
A new neighbor moved in next door. He was a good guy and we got along well but this somewhat ended and it was a thing where we would wave and such but not friendly in that we didn’t do anything together. This slowly deteriorated for some reason and I am not sure why. It got to a point where we didn’t speak and still don’t really but we don’t bother each other. At least we didn’t.
He mentioned that a chicken had dug up a flower in his garden. I offered to pay for the flower and he refused and the conversation ended. From this point on I did let the girls out but not as much and I did try to watch them. Occasionally they would get over there though.
I had seen him out yelling at the girls to get them out of his back yard. So I increased my effort and further limited their ranging time.
Not too much time passed, when one day I found a dead chicken near his leaking leach field. I called and asked if he knew anything about it. I thought possibly that his son got rowdy with his BB gun or something as I saw no mark on the chicken and let it go. Naturally he knew nothing about the dead chicken.
A short time later another one turned up missing. I was more upset this time. But I had no proof. I looked for the chicken but this time I couldn’t find it. A chicken will seldom venture more than a few hundred feet from their house and usually are easily found in the areas where they forage. They seem to have certain areas and they don’t really leave them often.
This passed to some degree and I had settled down and let all this go. I was down at my other neighbor’s house talking with him while he did some work on his car and I could see this neighbor with the chicken problem come around his house, pick up a rock, and fling it at the chickens that had wandered into his yard. Well, needless to say I lost it. We had some words and I tried to explain what a jerk he was and that I didn’t mind driving them away but I wasn’t extremely impressed with his throwing rocks at my chickens especially where I found the dead one in his yard and was missing another.
That evening I got to thinking about it and became really angry. My wife and I decided to get even. The next day I had the town over to inspect the leach field that had turned cesspool and they took some dye to the house because they weren’t sure that his septic came out there. I think we all knew better but the town has to follow their procedures. It ended up that the cesspool was bad. My neighbor, who mellowed slightly after this, said his estimate was $8900 to repair his septic. Needless to say I was very happy. I got rid of the stench and health hazard and got restitution for the two girls that I lost. On top of that the neighbor speaks!