Does your city have a limit on the number of dogs/cats you may own?

We have our Bijou, and three cats. Out of curiosity, I recently looked online to review the city ordinances/codes regarding pet ownership where we live and discovered the following:

"Number of Dogs and Cats Limited. In order to protect the public health and public sanitation, no more than two dogs and two cats or three animals (three dogs or three cats) of any one of the two species, shall be kept in or upon one residential unit or by one or more persons constituting one residential unit, unless the premises be licensed as a kennel."

So -- am I being noncompliant by having one dog and three cats? Aaaaaack!

I had no clue we had any limits whatsoever in our little city (pop 20,000); I only looked up the ordinances on a bit of a lark -- it's not prominently displayed, either -- I had to do a special search on the city codes to find this information.

What does your city specify (or does it?)?

I'm not sure if it's 4 pets per house or what because I don't own anything but dogs but I do know that legally, I can only have up to 4 dogs at a time.

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Originally Posted by Orangutango

I'm not sure if it's 4 pets per house or what because I don't own anything but dogs but I do know that legally, I can only have up to 4 dogs at a time.

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Actually for Calgary you can have as many dogs as you want pervided that they are all licensed. Some of the surrounding towns and municipalities have a limit (unless you have a kennel license or own a farmstead) but at the moment we're still free to have as many as we like. I think Edmonton has a limit and I know that Crossfield does.

I'm not sure if this was a rule for our CITY or just a subdivision rule, but the rule was no more than two pets, period. My family broke that rule so fast though.. I think we had, three cats and a dog LOL

I'm not sure what are rule is i better go check that out when i go to work!

nope its unlimited here, hence why I can live in the city legally with 20 some pets lol

Where would you go to find out this information? I tried searching google but nothing too helpful came up

i have no idea if Houston,Tx has a limit or not. If anyone knows,please let me know!

jessika what if you asked like a animal rescue place in your area?? that's what i'm gonna do or maybe the vet might know too!

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Originally Posted by Flatcoatluver

jessika what if you asked like a animal rescue place in your area?? that's what i'm gonna do or maybe the vet might know too!

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That's a good idea, thanks for the suggestion!!

Only problem is I'm fairly new to this area so I don't even know of any local shelters and such in my area yet. But I would imagine phone numbers for those will be a lot easier to find with a google search! :)

It is four pets here. I think it is also that in Houston

Within the main part of the city the limit is 2 cats and 2 dogs. Where I live, still technically within the city limits, but zoned differently, it's 6 cats and 6 dogs, but you have to written permission from everyone you share a property line with. Without written permission from your neighbors it's 4 & 4 in my area.

I bought my property before there were any limits in my area. I pay a yearly fee now for a special permit to keep a dog team within city limits. So I can have as many dogs as I want. I'm supposed to still obey the cat limit, but I don't.

The limit drives me nuts...my neighbor has 20 horses and another raises pigs--no restrictions at all on keeping livestock within my area, but they want to control how many cats I keep inside my house (part of the cat by-law here is that cats are not allowed outside unless confined to their owner's property.)

Yeah our city limit is 2 dogs I'm not sure about cats. I think it's ridiculous, 1 dog let to run loose around the neighborhood is 100 times more of a problem then my 3 that are kept in the house/yard all the time.

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Originally Posted by Crikit

Actually for Calgary you can have as many dogs as you want pervided that they are all licensed.

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Really? The woman we talked to a few months ago said that Calgary has a 4 dog limit. That's good to know though!

<<Where would you go to find out this information? I tried searching google but nothing too helpful came up >>


I just went to my city's website (if you're unsure of this, just Google your city/state and you'll probably get a website with lots of information about your city government, its rulings, schedules, who to contact for various city-related issues (police, trash pick-up, school information, everything).

You could certainly ask your vet, as long as they happen to live inside city limits as well -- otherwise, rural areas often have different determinations, and kennel licenses can be obtained as well, allowing for a larger number of pets (my city's ordinances reference kennel licenses, but do not explain what constitutes a kennel, what individuals/groups can obtain a kennel license, etc.). It's all very interesting! I guess I thought since I live in a small Midwestern city surrounded by rural/agricultural surroundings, we wouldn't be required to adhere to codes that I mistakenly assumed were "big city" kinds of limits.

Additionally, cats do not need to be licensed by the city, though of course they need to have their rabies shots administered. So the city is not privy to how many cats I have (unless my vet is required by law to forward this information to the city), but because I'm required to purchase a dog license (and willingly do so), city clerks are fully aware that we have just one dog. I guess if I licensed a second dog, that would be fine, but they'd stop me at the counter with a third dog's tags unless I qualified to be a kennel (not likely - we live in an older suburban neighborhood!).

That said, I'm keeping my three cats and my one dog -- but I'll probably talk to my local vet next time I'm in to discuss the matter further.