Walla Walla County, WA Animal Ordinances: Chickens & Livestock (2026)

WWCC § 17.26.010 requires every domestic animal or fowl kept in unincorporated Walla Walla County, outside commercial operations, to conform to the table of minimum standards in § 17.26.020, and the planning commission fills any gap for a species the table does not address under § 17.26.015. For fowl, poultry, rabbits, chinchillas and nutrias, the table permits a maximum combined total of fifty animals per six thousand square feet of dedicated space, prorated for smaller flocks, and requires the birds be housed in a pen or coop enclosed by a fence.

That coop or pen cannot sit closer than forty-five feet to any residence, and it must also meet the district's minimum yard setback if that figure is greater than forty-five feet. Selling from a retail stand, or killing and dressing the animals for commercial sale, is barred outright under this residential-keeping table. Larger livestock carry their own space figures in the same section: horses, mules, cows and llamas need twenty thousand square feet of open fenced area for the first two animals plus ten thousand additional square feet per animal after that, while sheep, goats and pygmy goats need twenty-five hundred square feet of open fenced area per head and follow the fencing standard written for horses.

Swine are capped at sixty square feet of open fenced area per animal, with tighter one-acre minimum lot sizes and two-animal caps inside the urban growth areas of Walla Walla, College Place, Burbank, Prescott and Waitsburg. Community Development applies these figures at the same site plan and building permit review used for other WWCC Title 17 development conditions.