Tonawanda, NY Animal Ordinances: Chickens & Livestock (2026)

Chapter 199, Article II of the Town of Tonawanda Code, adopted by the Town Board on 7-15-1974, makes it unlawful for any person, firm, association, copartnership or corporation to permit a horse, cattle, sheep, swine, fowl or other animal to run at large anywhere in the town outside the Village of Kenmore (Section 199-3). An editor's note under that section cross-references Chapter 71, Dogs, for dog-specific rules. Separately, the Town Board's Zoning Law addresses whether keeping such animals is allowed on a residential lot at all.

Table 20-a, referenced in Section 215-20.4, lists "Keeping of animals" for the R-1 (single-family), R-2 (two-family) and MR (mixed residential) districts and marks it with a dash in all three columns. Because the code states that uses identified with a dash "are expressly prohibited," raising fowl or farm animals, including backyard chickens, ducks or goats, is not a permitted use anywhere zoned residential in the Town of Tonawanda. A footnote to that table spells out what the prohibited use covers: the breeding, raising or keeping of bees, fowl, farm animals, exotic animals, pigeons, reptiles, or more than three dogs on one property.

A resident wanting livestock or fowl would need land in a nonresidential district or a variance from the Zoning Board of Appeals. The running-at-large ban and the zoning use table carry separate penalty clauses, so a loose animal and an illegal backyard flock can each trigger their own fine.