Hawk deterrent

[TalkALittle]

You can shoot a hawk if it attacking your livestock

No. No you can't. Federal law prohibits it.

 

[puppies9099]

No. No you can't. Federal law prohibits it.

Some farmer told me that I don't know if it is true sorry for the confusion

 

[modernsettlers]

Maybe the hawks in my neighborhood are lazy or well fed, but we free range and so far haven't had problems. We have coopers hawks and red-tailed hawks in abundance here. They fly over the yard sometimes while the birds are out, hunting in the vineyard adjacent to us. Freaks me out a bit (the chickens too), but we also have our trio of mature turkeys that range with our flock and I think they provide a great deterrent. Our jake is pretty territorial and the turks seem to spot any arial trouble before the rest. They sound the alarm and display their feathers, and everyone else runs back to the enclosed yard.

Can anyone weigh in on this? Will turkeys protect a flock from hawks? I've heard of others using geese, guineas, etc. but not turkey. Ours seem to be doing a good job.

 

[Folly's place]

Good for them! I only have chickens, and the bantams and younger smaller birds are more at risk. It's good to hear that the turkeys are helping, but there's still no room for them here. Mary

 

[Bridebeliever]

See US Fish and Wildlife. There are circumstances when a permit can be obtained OR you can have them come out and relocate a bird of prey. Check your local fish and wildlife for more information too!

 

[centrarchid]

As someone keeping a recreational backyard flock, you will not be able to get a depredation permit for use against raptors. Owing to cost of capture and relocating plus how little benefit will be received I doubt a backyard person will be able to have that service provided either. The permit is intended for those that have exhausted all reasonable options. So long as birds free-ranged without cover all reasonable options have not been tried.

 

[leliel]

Where I am in central wisconsin, we have a lot of raptors in the area.. I'd see at least one just about every other day.
Our free range flock has very few problems with raptor losses, despite this. The flock is roughly 100 birds currently.

I think this comes down to a few factors.

• Few/poor hunting perches around the chicken yard. On three sides there are no significant trees for over 100 yards. Edit to add: The 4th side still has about 30 yards between the birds and the treeline. They don't like that side of the yard too much.
• Good cover for the chickens. Lots of low brush, old truck toppers, all kinds of things to hide under when the alarm is raised.
• Several experienced roosters, and some new ones learning from their example. They're always on the lookout for anything dangerous
• Suspicious birds. All of our chickens are quite distrustful of moving shadows, even ours.

When a raptor does pass overhead, at least one bird will raise the alarm, and every bird in the flock runs straight for the nearest cover.
Once under cover, they stay there for some time. In the winter, they stay under cover most of the time, and much closer to cover if they do leave it.
Generally no more than 3 yards from cover in winter.

We do still occasionally lose birds to raptors, but over the last 4 years raccoons and foxes have been far more problematic than raptors, despite the raptor numbers.

 

[MysteriaSdrassa]

S-S-S

I do like this method

 

[puppies9099]

I would get black chickens hawks hate the color black
More than half of our flock is black, even if they have other colors on them as long as they are dark but have black
We don't get hawks at all
But we also have 2 adult great pyrenees in there with them

 

[TalkALittle]

Someone else posted on another thread that they rarely lose their black birds to hawks, mostly losing lighter colored birds. They hypothesized that it was because the black birds resembled crows, therefore the hawks didn't target them. I wonder if there is any truth to it.