Agriculture and Human Values
Abstract
In 2024 registration of all captive bird flocks became mandatory in Great Britain to improve disease surveillance at a time of increasing avian influenza outbreaks. However, little is known about how health and welfare practices are shaped by the diversity of relationships that characterise UK backyard birdkeeping. We use this moment of change to (1) examine the relationships between backyard keepers, their birds, and the poultry industry, and, (2) explore how registration legislation is responded to by backyard keepers. We use a netnographic approach, investigating activity on four public Facebook pages, and draw on the ‘animal turn’ in geography to guide interpretation of the findings. Most keepers valued their birds as companions, and as embodying aesthetic qualities. A minority of keepers kept birds for food production. Keepers of companion birds were more concerned about registration and the potential for birds to be classified as farmed animals than those who valued birds for their (re)productive roles. Social media acted as a tool to build relationships with other keepers and share health and welfare advice. The lack of consensus around birds’ roles contributed to the diverse reactions to registration and distrust in public authorities was implicated in low uptake of flock registration. Our findings suggest that registration legislation does not fully consider the diversity of backyard keepers’ relationships with their birds, each other, and the poultry industry. We suggest that for registration to be widely accepted more needs to be done to acknowledge different ways of living with birds.
