I REALLY can’t catch a break here! Or a breath 😭

[ChunkyBirb]

I will say that if it is a hawk please do not resort to shooting it. It is illegal in the US under the migratory bird treaty act. You could contact a falconer in your area and see if they can catch it (I don’t even know if they can do that but in my opinion it’s better than shooting it). You could also ask US fish and wildlife about what to do.

 

[donnavee]

Sorry for the play-by-play story, but the way I found her, & how she looked at me has haunted me & stuck in my brain.

Something got one of my khaki Campbell ducks the other day. my dog kept barking, I walked onto the porch to see if something was out there. I seen 3 of my ducks (1 khaki , 2 jumbo pekin) standing under their tarp cover, I waited for my other khaki to come into view, but never did. I let my ducks free range all day until night time, never had a problem until DECEMBER. So I put on my boots & went outside to look around. Didn’t see her anywhere. When I yell “duck ducks” they will come running, usually. So I yelled duck duck. Nothing. Took my dogs out of their run & out into the yard to help find her. They ran straight up the hill behind my chicken runs & along the fence line. I followed behind looking & listening. I got far back enough to where I seen a brown body lying under a tree limb. In between my sobbing & yelling NO I ran to her & seen that she was still alive, barely. She was laying on her stomach, with her neck stretched out onto the cold, snowy ground. I scooped her up & ran back to the house with her, got her inside & laid her into the hospital tub I had available. Ran back outside & put the other ducks away for the time being. By the time I got back inside, I watched her take her last breath. I checked her wounds, above her right wing was shredded, meat, bone, blood, her wing might’ve been pulled out of place ... I’m not sure. She had some blood on her neck, one puncture wound. Her neck was very limp, she wasn’t trying to move at all. My suspicion is a hawk... maybe a broad winged, or red tail. Does this sound like a hawks doing? I found where it attacked her first outside. Just blood. No footprints. Only her feathers. In the back where I found her, there’s a couple drops of blood trailing straight to where she was laying.

This is my first year keeping chickens & ducks. I first got them all back in March/April of this year. December has been awful, our first attacks, losses. I’ve lost 3 birds so far this month. 2 to predators, 1 for unknown causes. I know it’s apart of keeping chickens & ducks... but I never thought of how traumatizing it would be. I never found the body of my first loss (leghorn), finding my poor duck laying in the cold snow, scared, hurt & dying. I’m a very empathetic person (unfortunately).

RIP Duck Duck The picture with red circle is where I found her.
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We have a small pond and our ducks stay on it or the bank most of the day. The rest of the time is spent in a secure pen which opens into a fenced in wooded area. We also have run electric wire around it. Like others, winter seems to be the worst time for flying predators like hawks. We finally bought some avian netting on Amazon and covered the back wooded area because hawks were snatching ducklings. The stuff was a real pain to work with but we feel much better now that it's up. We don't seem to lose any of the ducks when on the pond - at least so far. If a hawk flies over, any ducks on the bank immediately jump in the pond and go to the middle or under the little dock we built.

 

[Percipen]

I'm so sorry for your loss. That's so heartbreaking it's my first year with ducks too and a week ago one of my runners had a seizure and I'm still shaken up from it. The best we can do is take preventative measures and give those babies good happy lives. It sucks, but unfortunately there are some things that are just out of our control

 

[ElisEt144]

As ChunkyBirb mentioned, hawks (and owls - all raptors for that matter) are federally protected wildlife in the US. Shooting or trapping them is illegal in every state. Heck, even possessing feathers is illegal for most of us! Contact a local falconer, or state's Fish and Wildlife Department. Even if they can't remove the bird, they may have some strategies to help you protect your birds.
So sorry for your loss. I lost two of my girls to a particularly crafty and persistent racoon earlier this year.

 

[cmom]

Electric fencing works good for coyotes bobcats etc. not so much for hawks and owls. Neighbors have had trouble with owls this year.

I had issues with them too. I put some good heavy duty netting covering my pens. Problem solved.

 

[cmom]

There are some threads with posts with pictures of the owl plaguing me.

 

[bryan99705]

Fighting similar problem having watched a hawk a hen in my corral but was able to intervene in time.
I'm going to try stretching high test fishline in a grid (strings about 3' apart) over my corral area where our chickens and ducks hangout, and hang either old Christmas ornaments or balls of tin foil. I'm hoping this will interfere with a hawks attack. I've also drilled in short #9 wire pieces into the fence post tops to prevent the hawks from perching there.
i'll let you know how it works