Chickens attacked hawk

Last night we were sitting on our deck enjoying the beautiful evening, right before sunset. Suddenly, there was a huge commotion in one of our chicken pens. All of the chickens were rushing to one part of the pen, and my husband could see something brown in the midst of the pile. He thought a dove or other small bird had gotten in to eat their food and they had gone after it.

Suddenly, a HAWK burst from the pile of chickens, flapping and scrambling for its life! It was able to get airborne, and flew out of the pen as quickly as it could. We went down to the pen - all of our chickens were fine, no one appears to have been injured.

We had given a friend of ours two young pullets last year to add to her small flock of three. She gave one back because our two bullied her three (our two were about a month younger than hers), and she joked about our badazz country hens. Well, I guess our country chickens showed that hawk that it wasn't welcome! I see a number of hawks daily, and it's the first time one has actually gotten in the pen. I'll bet that one won't be back!

 

The pen it went into has my four-and-a-half month old barred rocks. The young cockerels have recently started crowing, and they're full of testosterone - and there are seven of them! They weren't an easy meal. As the hawk found out!