How do you know if you are inside or outside city limits?

[Honeybee22]

This might be a stupid question, but I'm gonna go ahead and ask...
How do you know if you are inside or outside city limits?

Here's where my question arises:
When we moved into our place we got a card from the post office saying that we were considered rural and how rural postal service meant we could by stamps and envelopes from our mail-person. BUT our neighborhood looks like any other neighborhood in suburbia. Sure, around the corner from our neighborhood people have a cow or two and people up down our street have chickens and such, but it really looks like a plain old neighborhood with houses and yards butted up against one another.

Does rural postal service lean towards us living outside city limits? I have a surprise cockerel and was just wondering. We don't live in an HOA, so if we are considered outside city limits then I think we can keep him legally (But I still have plans in place stay on good terms with my neighbors).

Thanks for any help in advance.

 

[CascadiaRiver]

We also live in suburbia and are considered rural, actually two blocks north of me there is a cow farm, lol! We're in the same situation as you, we keep roosters for a short while (no longer than two years) and get rid of them because while its legal we dont wanna make any enemies! I would assume you can keep him as long as your neighbors are okay with it!

 

[Honeybee22]

That's my hope. My neighbors on the backside of my yard have chickens that are pretty loud. I hear geese and chickens down a couple houses and horses and cows that must be pretty close to us. Sometimes they're so loud they sound like they're coming down the street! I love it!

I think I live in a pretty accepting neighborhood, but my plan is to bring him in at night just so he's not crowing at 4 am. Pretty sure nobody's going to be cool with that. Right now he's no louder than a chicken and only crows when my dogs are out or when I get to the coop in the morning to let him and his ladies out for he day. We'll see how it all goes.

 

[MommaHen2Many]

a simple search could tell us...what is your zip code? I'll look it up. I'm in E. Washington by the way. I have relatives in Id. Falls...I can see what you mean about "in the city"...

 

[MommaHen2Many]

actually I was just playing with googlemaps. If you go to googlemaps type in your "city name" for example. City of Idaho Falls. it will outline the city's boundary lines....some have "holes" where certain areas are not part of the city, but part of the county, so if you live in one of those space, only county rules would apply. we happen to live in the county, but our driveway & street address is on a street owned by a city. So, we frequently remind people on the "other side" of the street" that they are city, we are county....I'm sure that will change one day, but hopefully we will be grandfathered in for animals.

 

[Honeybee22]

Yeah. According to the map on Google my side of the street is city and across the street is county. Very weird because the houses across the street have almost no backyards and on our side we have some nice half acre yards.

BUT the post office says I'm rural, so I'm just gonna lie to myself and say Google is wrong and keep my rooster, LOL!

 

[MommaHen2Many]

sounds like that's the way most of your neighborhood is acting anyway...we want critters! lol hopefully all will be well!

 

[rosemarythyme]

Probably depends on your location, but some counties do have online plat maps that will show you the zoning code for each property, so you can get the exact designation for your address by searching the county website.

 

[Honeybee22]

Thanks so much! "Plat maps" were the words I needed in order to do the right search. What I found out is that while Google was wrong, it wasn't in my favor. The people across the street are city, but so am I. Booooooo!

Still keeping the rooster though