Chicken Massacre

[chickengeorgeto]

A full grown hawk can carry a chicken no problem.

I am not wanting to argue but to help chicken keepers learn what is killing their birds. Most standard mature hens weigh about 4 pounds (think of a white leghorn a smallish standard size hen). Very few hawks will weigh anything near what the white leghorn hen weighs. If you handle a live hawk or even a GHO the first thing that is apparent is how light, and small hawks and owls really are. It is truly impossible for a 4 pound hawk to ever fly away with a 5 pound chicken. No one here has considered the increased drag or wind resistance that a dead chicken imposes on a hawks ability to first get and then to stay airborne.

There are videos on youtube of hawks preying on chickens and if these videos show anything, they show hawks repeatedly trying to and repeatedly failing to fly away with even a smallish chicken. A bantam chicken that only weighs about 20% of what a standard chicken weighs, (about as much as a gray squirrel) is a different matter except for the increased wind resistance or drag a dead chicken creates.

A female red tail hawk could get off the ground with a bantam chicken if there was a strong and steady head wind crossing the she hawks wings to generate lift. But even then there is the problem of drag slowing her down and killing forward momentum. Also any hawk with a large kill in its talons must run to create air speed before getting air borne. How can a she hawk run with both her feet full of dead hen? There are even videos of red tails (our largest hawk) catching small dogs that weigh less than 4 pounds but the hawk was still forced to eat the dog were it lay.

 

[Mahlzeit]

I am not wanting to argue but to help chicken keepers learn what is killing their birds. Most standard mature hens weigh about 4 pounds (think of a white leghorn a smallish standard size hen). Very few hawks will weigh anything near what the white leghorn hen weighs. If you handle a live hawk or even a GHO the first thing that is apparent is how light, and small hawks and owls really are. It is truly impossible for a 4 pound hawk to ever fly away with a 5 pound chicken. No one here has considered the increased drag or wind resistance that a dead chicken imposes on a hawks ability to first get and then to stay airborne.

There are videos on youtube of hawks preying on chickens and if these videos show anything, they show hawks repeatedly trying to and repeatedly failing to fly away with even a smallish chicken. A bantam chicken that only weighs about 20% of what a standard chicken weighs, (about as much as a gray squirrel) is a different matter except for the increased wind resistance or drag a dead chicken creates.

A female red tail hawk could get off the ground with a bantam chicken if there was a strong and steady head wind crossing the she hawks wings to generate lift. But even then there is the problem of drag slowing her down and killing forward momentum. Also any hawk with a large kill in its talons must run to create air speed before getting air borne. How can a she hawk run with both her feet full of dead hen? There are even videos of red tails (our largest hawk) catching small dogs that weigh less than 4 pounds but the hawk was still forced to eat the dog were it lay.

I guess my eyes must lie to me or maybe I dreamed it all up.

 

[Sparkway]

Lisa
I had the exact same scenario happen to me in NJ. My son came home and found our LF Light Brahma being eaten by a red tailed hawk under a bush too. She had been initially attacked in two other areas of the pen there were two areas of feathers. She was too big to be carried off but head and neck were the only things eaten at that point. I have pics I posted in another thread but they are graphic the hawk flew off and got caught in the bushes but did get away!

 

[mpguay]

Lisa W
I am having the same problem. Lost 3 silkies this week. During the day we think. just a couple feathers as evidence. They are inside an electric net fence with ample cover.
We put up a game cam but it takes a pic everytime a hen walks by, but we'll see if something else jumps out. I've only got 4 silkies left out of 9. We have seen a red tailed hawk many times. And we've had coyotes before. But none since the electric netting. My guess so far is a red tailed hawk. I think it could carry a dead silkie, but certainly not a struggling bantam.

Game cams are fantastic. We've caught some very interesting things on them...