Henrico County, VA Animal Ordinances: Bird Protection (2026)

Henrico County Code § 5-250 designates three bird sanctuaries by metes-and-bounds description. The Lakeside sanctuary runs along Lakeside Avenue, Hilliard Road, Woodman Road, Parham Road, Staples Mill Road and Interstate 64 to the Richmond city boundary, and includes the Ginter Gardens, Ginter Gardens Addition, Lakewood, Lakewood Estates, Valentine Hills, Rocky Branch Farm and Lydell Heights subdivisions. Three Chopt Elementary School and its grounds, including its outdoor classroom at 1600 Skipwith Road, are separately designated a sanctuary, as is the entire Old Westham neighborhood bounded by River Road, Ridge Road, Forest Avenue, Lindsay Road, Lindsay Court, Little Westham Creek and College Road.

Within all three areas, § 5-250(d) makes it unlawful to willfully and maliciously trap, shoot, hunt, or attempt to shoot or molest any bird or wild fowl, or to rob a bird or wild fowl nest. The only carve-out is for starlings or similar birds that congregate to the point of becoming a nuisance or menace to health or property; those may be destroyed, but never on private property without the written approval of that property's owner. The ordinance protects birds only inside the three mapped sanctuaries; it does not create a countywide bird-protection rule, so trapping or hunting birds outside these boundaries falls to whatever state wildlife law otherwise applies rather than to this section.