Keeping hens · National rules

Can you keep backyard chickens in New Zealand?

Registration: conditions apply, for the keepers covered below. Who decides where hens can live, and the bird-flu and welfare rules, follow.

Read from 9 official sources34 passages quotedChecked October 28, 2026

At a glance

Registering your flock

Conditions apply

Where hens can live

Set locally

Bird-flu housing orders

Status needs rechecking

Welfare rules

Rule identified
Set locally

Who decides where hens can live

The national law we read gives a named local body its own powers over where hens can live. What the checked sources say:

  • A territorial authority may make bylaws for its district regulating the keeping of animals, bees and poultry (Local Government Act 2002, s 146(1)(a)(v)).
  • Check your district or city council's bylaws before keeping hens.

Each council's own bylaws were not read, except Kapiti Coast District Council's, shown as an example.

The law's own words are quoted under national rules on keeping poultry below.

How to check: Look up the local rules where you live (the ordinances, bylaws or zoning of the body named here), or ask that office, before you get hens.

A sourced reading of national law in New Zealand, not legal advice. Local ordinances and zoning, HOA rules, and any local rooster or coop limits aren't covered here yet: check your local code before you get hens.

Keeping your flock

These findings cover the national scope stated below. They do not determine whether chickens are allowed at a particular home. City zoning, property restrictions and other local rules are outside this research.

Registering as a poultry keeper

Conditions apply to this finding

Jurisdiction: New Zealand

Applies to: Chicken producers as defined in regulation 3A of the Animal Products Regulations 2021: people who produce breeder, broiler (meat), layer or rearer laying chickens, day-old chicks or fertile eggs.

Outside this finding's scope

  • A person who farms 100 chickens or fewer and sells chickens or fertile eggs direct to the consumer or end user (reg 3A(2)).

What the checked sources say

  • A chicken producer must operate under a registered risk management programme (Animal Products Regulations 2021, reg 40A(1)); MPI says the programme must be registered with MPI before you start operating.
  • A layer chicken is a chicken that produces non-fertile eggs for primary processing (reg 3).
  • Whether a household keeping hens only for its own eggs, or a small seller of table eggs, is a chicken producer was not established; no general register of backyard poultry keepers was found in the texts read (Animal Products Act 1999 s 4; Animal Products Regulations 2021 regs 3, 3A and 40A and Schedule 2; Biosecurity Act 1993 ss 130 and 131; Animal Welfare Act 1999 ss 2, 4, 10 and 12). Ask MPI.

Thresholds

  • Left out: people who farm 100 chickens or fewer and sell chickens or fertile eggs direct to the consumer or end user (reg 3A(2)).

Authority: Ministry for Primary Industries

Fee: Not established from the sources checked.

The official wording

Bird-flu housing orders

Current status needs rechecking

An official current-status link has not been established.

Orders can change between checks. A missed check or an expired order does not establish that no order applies.

Housing-order finding as checked on 2026-10-28

The scope and conditions below are a dated record, not confirmation of today's position.

Conditions apply to this finding

Uses housing orders in this scope: Yes, according to the checked evidence, within the limits listed under “Outside this finding’s scope” below.

Jurisdiction: New Zealand

Applies to: Place and area controls under the Biosecurity Act 1993 for pests and unwanted organisms.

Outside this finding's scope

  • Neither section was found to name housing as such. Whether a controlled-area notice under s 131(3)(b) has been or can be used to require poultry to be housed, and whether H5 bird flu is handled as a pest or unwanted organism under these sections, were not established from the sections read (Biosecurity Act 1993 ss 130 and 131).

What the checked sources say

  • If an inspector or authorised person believes or suspects on reasonable grounds that a pest or unwanted organism is or has been in a place, they may declare that place and neighbouring places a restricted place (s 130(1)), and may direct that specified organisms there be isolated, confined or stored as they direct (s 130(5)).
  • A chief technical officer or a management agency may declare a controlled area, which may be all or part of New Zealand, and by public notice restrict, regulate or prohibit the movement into, within or from that area of specified organisms, risk goods or other goods (s 131(2) and (3)(a)).
  • While a controlled area is in force, the chief technical officer or management agency may also give notice that specified organisms within it must be subject to the treatment and procedures specified in the notice (s 131(3)(b)).
  • Current controls are not shown here. Check MPI's H5 bird flu page.
Checked
Recheck due

Historical evidence, as checked

These quotations record what was checked on the dates shown. They do not confirm an order's current status.

Small-flock welfare minimums

Rule identified for the scope below

Jurisdiction: New Zealand

Applies to: The owner and every person in charge of an animal; an animal includes any live bird.

What the checked sources say

  • Ensure the animal's physical, health and behavioural needs are met in accordance with good practice and scientific knowledge (Animal Welfare Act 1999, s 10).
  • Those needs include proper and sufficient food and water, adequate shelter and the opportunity to display normal patterns of behaviour (s 4).
  • Failing to comply with s 10 is an offence (s 12(a)); not meeting a relevant minimum standard in a code of welfare is rebuttable evidence in a prosecution (s 13(1A)).
  • MPI says anyone who owns or is in charge of layer hens, commercially or at home, needs to comply with the codes of welfare. In the version read (an Internet Archive copy of MPI's page of 19 November 2025, before the minor amendments that took effect on 30 June 2026), the Code of Welfare: Layer Hens (2018) defines a hen as a female chicken (of any age) kept primarily for laying eggs and sets minimum standards such as continuous access to sufficient water and shelter from adverse weather.
  • Minor amendments to the Code took effect on 30 June 2026; the amended text was not read.

The official wording

National rules on keeping poultry

Conditions apply to this finding

Jurisdiction: New Zealand

Applies to: Keeping poultry, including a few hens, within a district or city council's district.

Outside this finding's scope

  • Each council's own bylaws were not read, except Kapiti Coast District Council's, shown as an example.

What the checked sources say

  • A territorial authority may make bylaws for its district regulating the keeping of animals, bees and poultry (Local Government Act 2002, s 146(1)(a)(v)).
  • Example only, for the Kapiti Coast District: its bylaw, made under ss 145 and 146(a)(v), requires a council licence to keep a rooster in an urban area and allows no more than 12 poultry on one urban premises unless a licence for more is granted.
  • Check your district or city council's bylaws before keeping hens.

The official wording

Selling eggs in New Zealand? →Licence, small-flock line, markets and cartons, on their own page.Selling: Licence: depends

More countries we've checked

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Common questions

Do I have to register backyard chickens in New Zealand?
Registration: conditions apply. The finding covers: Chicken producers as defined in regulation 3A of the Animal Products Regulations 2021: people who produce breeder, broiler (meat), layer or rearer laying chickens, day-old chicks or fertile eggs. Left out: people who farm 100 chickens or fewer and sell chickens or fertile eggs direct to the consumer or end user (reg 3A(2)). Outside this finding's scope: A person who farms 100 chickens or fewer and sells chickens or fertile eggs direct to the consumer or end user (reg 3A(2)). Authority: Ministry for Primary Industries.
Can I keep chickens in my backyard in New Zealand?
The national law we read gives a named local body its own powers over where hens can live. A territorial authority may make bylaws for its district regulating the keeping of animals, bees and poultry (Local Government Act 2002, s 146(1)(a)(v)). Check your district or city council's bylaws before keeping hens. Each council's own bylaws were not read, except Kapiti Coast District Council's, shown as an example. Look up the local rules where you live (the ordinances, bylaws or zoning of the body named here), or ask that office, before you get hens.
Do I have to keep my hens indoors for bird flu in New Zealand?
Housing orders come and go, so we never show one as current. We haven't confirmed an official current-status page for it.

Allowed where you live? Then keep the records.

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