Neighborhoods That Allow Chickens

Leander allows residents to keep chickens, and the official rules are published on the Leander Animal Services page. The ordinance is reasonably permissive for anyone with a suitable yard — but the setback requirement is the detail that trips people up most often.

• ✅Chickens are allowed within Leander city limits
• 🔢Maximum of 10 chickens per property
• 🚫Roosters prohibited on properties smaller than 3 acres
• 📏Coops must be at least 50 feet from any neighboring residence
• 🏠Chickens must be kept in a hutch or coop — a fenced yard alone doesn't count
• 📐Roosters (on 3+ acres) must be kept 200 feet from any neighboring dwelling
• ⚠️Even if the city allows it, your HOA may not — verify your CC&Rs

Source: City of Leander Animal Services · leandertx.gov/464/Animal-Services · Sec 2.03.008 and Sec 2.03.011

The 50-foot setback from neighboring residences is the practical hurdle for most Leander homeowners. On a typical single-family lot, the distance between your home and your neighbor's is often less than 50 feet, so coop placement needs to be carefully mapped before you build anything.

Liberty Hill previously limited residents to just two chickens per household — a number so low it was widely regarded as impractical. Texas HB 1750, the Right to Farm law that took effect in 2023, strengthened protections for small flocks and prohibits most cities from banning fewer than six hens on a residential lot. That state protection has effectively superseded the old two-hen limit.

• ✅Texas HB 1750 protects the right to keep a minimum of six hens on a residential lot
• 📜Old city ordinance limited residents to two chickens, but state law now supersedes it for hens
• 🚫Roosters remain subject to local noise ordinances
• ⚠️HOA rules remain the dominant restriction for most Liberty Hill homeowners
• 🌾Properties in Liberty Hill's ETJ typically face fewer restrictions

If your property sits outside any city limits in unincorporated Williamson County, you're in the most permissive situation available. County-level regulations on backyard chickens are minimal to nonexistent for small residential flocks. Communities like Serenity Springs sit in the ETJ rather than within Liberty Hill city limits, which removes the municipal layer of regulation entirely.

• ✅Generally no county-level restrictions on small backyard flocks
• 🌾Acreage properties in the ETJ have the most flexibility
• 📋Always verify any deed restrictions that may apply to your specific property
• 🐓Roosters are generally permitted in unincorporated areas

Two bills came close to changing everything for HOA communities in Texas. Neither made it into law.

Texas Property Code Section 202.024, passed in 2023, does protect HOAs formed after September 1, 2023 — those HOAs cannot prohibit up to six chickens on a single-family lot. Most established master-planned communities in Liberty Hill and Leander were formed well before that date, so this protection doesn't apply to them.

If keeping backyard chickens is genuinely important to your family, I want to be honest: most of the large master-planned communities in Liberty Hill and Leander won't work for you under current rules. Santa Rita Ranch, Rancho Sienna, Stonewall Ranch, Clearwater Ranch, Orchard Ridge, and most other major HOA communities prohibit poultry in their CC&Rs.

The communities that do work are the ones that explicitly allow chickens (Rancho Santa Fe and Durham Park with conditions), sit in the ETJ on acreage without restrictive HOA covenants, or are non-HOA properties within Leander city limits where the city ordinance governs.