I’m not against farming. I just am against this practice. I’m not backing down this time, I’ve had enough. I can’t live like this.”

Kate Almy

Drivers cruising toward the fork in the road that splits West and Old Main roads at the Tiverton/Little Compton line may notice a percussive accompaniment to their ride. Flanked on either side of the fork lay an assortment of green fields mostly populated by corn and owned by various farmers, some of whom employ crop cannons to keep their produce safe from birds. These cannons, typically powered by propane that generate sonic blasts of up to 120 decibels, are the subject of a recent complaint by a neighbor who said she’s had just about enough of them.

“I can’t be outside,” said Kate Almy, who lives at 90B Old Main Road, adjacent to a series of fields owned by various area farmers.

“The sound is unbearable. I’m always waiting for the cannon to be fired, and the shot is awful. It’s shocking ... I’ve got the air conditioners on, two TVs, the door is closed, and the windows aren’t open. Still, I can hear them. It’s like a bomb going off.”

Almy has lived on a plot of land wedged between Old Main Road and the Watson Reservoir for the better part of two decades, and first complained about the cannons in 2015. Nothing much came of that complaint, but she told the Little Compton Town Council Thursday that the noise is as bad as it’s ever been and it’s past time to address it.

“Some may say I should have known when I moved next to farmland that stuff like this would be happening and I just had to accept it,” she said. “No. For the past seven days, they’ve been going off every three minutes. My dogs go crazy every time. They’re just not acceptable.”

At Thursday’s meeting, council members instructed town clerk Carol Wordell to send a notice of the complaint to  the farmland's owner, who has not yet been positively identified.

"They instructed me to send the notice, but the option to ask for a work session belongs to the farmer, to ask for one within the ten (10) day period of receiving the letter of notice," Wordell wrote in an e-mail clarifying the town's response.

What will happen then remains to be seen, town solicitor Tony DeSisto said.

Disputed in agricultural areas nationwide, the repetitive noise of crop cannons necessitate a case-by-case solution, DeSisto said. According to state law, the maximum amount of sound that can be generated from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. is 55 decibels. When paired with the state’s Right to Farm Act passed in 1982, a farmer is protected when the noise generated from livestock or farm equipment is used in “normal, generally accepted” farm procedures.

“So then the question would be whether or not these crop cannons are normal and generally accepted,” said DeSisto. “That I don’t know today.”

As is typical of agricultural complaints, the land owner will receive a notice from the town and from there, “the town is then required by state law and ordinance to afford the farmer a work session and give them an opportunity to explain what’s going on before any action can be taken,” DeSisto said.

At least one councilor said last week that he sympathizes with Almy’s plight.

“I went to Kate’s house and I listened for an hour,” councilor Patrick McHugh said. “It’s obvious that the noise is unacceptable, and anyone living there would be going nuts.”

Said Almy: “I’m not against farming. I just am against this practice. I’m not backing down this time, I’ve had enough. I can’t live like this.”