Hawk!

[SunAngel]

My daughter let our big girl flock out to freerange yesterday evening. She went and sat on the back porch about 5 feet from them. About 2 mins later a huge hawk swooped down and just missed taking my full grown EE hen, Aurora. DD said the hawk was less than 2 feet above Aurora. She jumped up, just as the EE screeched and the hawk flew off. DD made me come out and help watch the chickens, think the incident rattled her a bit, she is 17. The hawk must have been eyeing them in their run beforehand from a tree in our backyard and was thrilled when DD let them out. The hawk had 35 to choose from and went after the largest hen instead of one of the 3-4 month olds in the group.

This is our first 'almost' predator attack in over a year of having chickens. I am afraid that now that the hawk knows they get let out, it will be here waiting. Is there anything that can be done to scare hawks away?

 

[fasbendera]

I posted a similar question and the owl decoys don't work. You need a tractor. Even though I have a huge run they have eaten every bit of grass so I like to let the girls out 2-3 year old hens. We have hawks but they seem to leave the larger hens alone. I think the hawk pulled up because it realized the chicken was to large. I do meaties and when they get to be a certain size the attacks stop. I not only have one hawk but she has raised threee broods and we can see all four of them waiting in the trees. The meaties I order enough that I just chalk it up the survial of the fittest and mother nature. My hens I am alot more protective of and I am now researching a tractor for my younger birds because this year the hawk took out 18 of my brood of hens from age 4 weeks to 12 weeks of age. I was raising some for a friend so they took the surviving 4 and I started over. I have a new group started and I have not put them outside yet unless I am sitting right by them in the grass. I hope this helps.

 

[SunAngel]

Thanks, I won't waste money on a Owl decoy then. It would take forever to swap out 35-40 hens in a tractor or the tractor would be too big to move to fit them all in lol. I will just tell daughter to keep herself between the trees and the chickens. Mine have a large run, but they love the grass and bugs, so we try to let them out once a day. They don't have a roo to protect them yet, but I am growing one out for next Spring.

Do hawks have a certain hunting time?

 

[PeepsInc]

I've been having the same issues here. I keep the shotgun ready. I have far to much time,money,& feelings invested to feed my birds to predators.