Owner facing lawsuit defends French rooster Maurice for crowing too loudly
"Nature has to stay what it is and the countryside should get back its normal noises", said Fesseau.
SAINT-PIERRE-D’OLERON (Reuters) - At first glance, Maurice, a French rooster living in the backyard of Corrine Fesseau in the western French village of Saint-Pierre-d’Oleron, looks like a mere innocent chicken.
But according to Fesseau’s neighbours, Maurice’s loud crows has caused them trouble. In July, they filed a lawsuit against Fesseau, alleging that the noise had been waking them up every morning and that the disturbance counts as audible nuisance.
The Rochefort court in western France is set to deliver a final judgment on the case on Thursday (September 5).
According to the court complaint, the neighbours, Jean-Louis and Joelle Biron, who had live in the Limousin region of France and have a second home in Saint-Pierre-d’Oleron, had said Maurice would crow at 5 a.m. every morning, which they would hear from their window a couple metres away from Fesseau’s coop.
But Fesseau told Reuters on Thursday (August 29) the noise was "normal."
"I’m not going to let myself be pushed around," Fesseau said. "Nature has to stay what it is and the countryside should get back its normal noises."
The lawsuit has shed a light on the growing misunderstanding between residents of French metropolitan areas and locals of small-town villages in rural France.
A resident of the southwestern French city of Souston is set to appear in court on September 3 facing a lawsuit filed by neighbours, who normally live in the city, on charges of audible nuisance because of ducks living in his backyard.
Earlier this year, residents of Saint-Martin de Colmar also threatened to file a lawsuit for the church bells’ loud rings.
Fesseau said neighbours visiting from the city should adapt to the countryside’s noises.
"When we (countryside residents) go to the city, we tolerate the noise, we don’t like it, but we adapt," she said. "So when they (city residents) come to the countryside, they should do the same thing."
In Fesseau’s village, locals have been backing Maurice. Local business owner Benoit Guitton has started selling T-shirts in support of the rooster.
