
“We have been suffering from this stink for years, they remove the manure from the chickens, throw it into the garden and plow it. It’s hell, you’ve been stinking for a month, “complains Manuel Pérez, a neighbor of Tagoro, who says the air is unbreathable” even with a mask. “
The inhabitants of this peaceful neighborhood of Tacoronte, in which there are only houses with gardens, hardly any cars pass by and the tranquility is difficult to break, assure that for at least five years they have suffered this situation, due to a “supposedly illegal” farm of chickens that are a few meters from their homes and in which they also live with hundreds of pigeons that can be seen with the naked eye. “If the air comes down, it catches us, if it goes up, the neighbors of Juan Fernández, that is, the entire perimeter where the wind goes, the smell is hellish,” adds Manuel.
He is not the only one who suffers from it. José Manuel Afonso, Santo, Domingo Carlos, Candelaria Abreu and Filiberto assure that with the heat and in the summer months, the problem increases and they cannot have the windows open because the flies invade them. “They are going to eat us,” they ironically.
There are even those who have considered selling their house because they can no longer bear the situation and in order that no one can solve it and the administrations “throw the ball to each other”, they have decided to leave the neighborhood. “One of them lost a customer, the house is great, but when he felt the nauseating smell in the environment, the buyer backed out,” says Santo.
They believe that the exploitation is not legal because at first glance it is a greenhouse “in which they have put between 300 and 400 chickens and every time they remove the manure they throw it into the garden and that ferments. There is no one who lives here, ”says Domingo Carlos.
Manuel explains that “a farm needs to go through a series of procedures to make it legal. The aspiring farmer has to ask the City Council if the land is suitable or not for that specific use. If it is, you have to find a veterinarian to make a sketch of the farm and that documentation is sent to the Department with their respective photos and this makes an inspection and gives the final approval. In this case, it only has one net and the water enters, the chickens are not protected, when it rains, as in the last days, they all get wet ”.
The rain, however, is the only thing that helps a little to mitigate the strong stench.
They also suspect it because another of those affected asked the Agrarian Extension Office “and they are not aware” of any installation of this type and characteristics and when a councilor who does not remember his name went to the City Council “he told him that letters had already been taken in the matter because the exploitation was illegal ”.
The Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries and Waters Government of the Canary Islands confirmed to this newspaper that in the Register of Livestock Farms (REGA) there is no chicken farm in that area and therefore, if it is ‘illegal’ as the neighbors claim , the competitions are municipal.
In this regard, the Councilor for the Environment and Sustainability, -area that encompasses matters related to agriculture, livestock and fishing- Carmela Díaz Vilela, assured that the City Council is collecting all the necessary information to be able to act although an action has already been taken previous.
Specifically, it refers to the fact that weeks ago the municipal technicians contacted the rancher, who told them “that he had everything legalized”, to ask him to do “good management” of the manure.
According to the councilor, “the issue was resolved because the excrement was incorporated into the soil to fertilize and the bad smell began to subside.”
But the version of the neighbors is exactly the opposite. “Before I had all the excrement piled up, but a local policeman came, told him to bury it and throw it as compost and that rotten earth moves it and it is hellish. The smell reaches Jover ”, they emphasize.
Registration in the REGA depends on the number of animals present, since if you do not trade eggs, with few animals you would not have to be registered.
However, the neighbors are suspicious and believe that he may be profiting “because that amount of chickens is not just for manure,” says Manuel.
Unsuccessful complaint writings
Those affected presented, without success, complaint documents at the City Council and although Carmela Díaz does not have any complaint in their areas, she does not rule out that it may be in another, such as the Department of Health.
They have also called the Local Police “and they do not appear because they say that you have to report to the City Council, the Civil Guard and the same thing and we have been doing this for years,” they say.
“The neighborhood has suffered with subterranean termites, some houses have been affected and now this, bad smells and an invasion of flies for which we do not stop flitting. There is no one who lives here ”, they reiterate.