Hawks after my chickens, what do I do.

[chickenmama109]

I everyone I have 13 chickens and there have been hawks keeping an eye on them and I'm afraid sometime soon they will get one of my girls. My flock free ranges and has some tree cover but not enough. I was wondering if there was anything I could do to repeal them. Would bright colored chickens saddles work. I do have a rooster but I dont know if he would keep all of them safe. Any ideas on how to repeal hawks. Thanks

 

[Wezdin]

chicken saddles will not help, i have experienced that everybody and their brothers has a way to repel hawks and they don't always work. I hang a old coat out and that seems to work. I'm not saying this will fix all your hawk problems, but it has worked for me.

 

[DobieLover]

The roof of a large covered run is the best hawk repellent.
You can also try hanging CDs around, moving owl decoys and things like that. Most of those don't work for long if at all. If the hawks are hanging around they are likely sizing up they're next meal.
Sorry but this is the harsh reality of free ranging chickens.

 

[Cadence A Waller]

I don't know how to keep your chickens safe while they are free ranging with a hawk around. I am surprised that the hawk hasn't gotten one of your chickens already. I had a hawk problem last year and had to keep my flock of chickens that usually free range in the run for a couple weeks until the hawk moved on.

 

[HuskerHens18]

The best Hawk repellent is to deplete his food source, keep chickens penned up if you can. We've also hunted some of the rabbits to lower food populations. It works for a while, but hawks always return eventually, they are the worst predator IMHO. I wish you good luck and hope you never lose any of your chickens ❤

 

[SilberHenne]

Nothing will deter them. You can stand outside watching them all day and a hawk will still kill chickens right in front of you. We lost 4 hens before figuring out what was killing them, and then I came home one evening to a pair of huge Barred Owls eating one of my bantams. Broke my heart. We put a metal roof on their run the next evening and the two owls were watching us do it and hooting up a storm because we had interrupted their dinner buffet. We thankfully haven't lost another chicken since!

I don't leave the run door open anymore, and at first I hated locking them in, but even if I let them out, they all just run as fast as they can under the shed or stay inside the coop. They were all so terrified and it made me realize chickens don't always prefer open skies overhead and everyone has been much happier.

We also have hawks, eagles, and vultures fly over and the hens just about have a heart attack everytime! The roosters are no braver and would be no match for a hawk. I wish you and your flock the best of luck! Aerial assaults are the worst.

 

[Kessel23]

What type of hawk is it? Just saying but tree cover will do nothing against the majority of chicken hawks like Red tailed hawks and cooper's hawks, just makes hunting easier. Hawks don't fly around up in the sky diving down on chickens, they will just sit up in a tree and wait for the chickens to come as close as possible then attack. Hawks are very smart and figure things out fast. We had a cooper's hawk many years ago that would pick off bantams from out flock but he did it like it was a game, he would land right next to them instead of just grabbing them and then chase after them and kill them. I also have dog kennels right by the coop, one time a cooper's hawk killed and ate a chicken 3 feet from the kennel and let the dogs watch him the whole time. I saw a cooper's hawk a few months ago miss an attack on one of my birds, he flew extremely low over the kennel and got a stud to jump up and try to grab him, the hawk did not flinch and the stud fell on his butt after missing. In my experience hawks will figure out what is going to harm them and what's not very fast.

Thick small bushes/shrubs to run under will be more helpful than tree cover, they provide cover without providing a hunting spot at the same time. I have not had a successful hawk attack in over 5 years, not sure what is stopping them but I did have 21 cockerels/roosters in the flock this summer. 2 sharp shinned hawks did catch a bird but were unable to kill it.

 

[chickenmama109]

Thanks everyone. I dont know much about hawks so I dont really know what kind of hawk it is but I do know that it is all black and there are a couple of them that fly right over my yard. They even go really low to the ground around my chickens so I dont know why they have not tryed to get one yet but I will try everything I can to scare them off. Thanks so much for everyone's help

 

[Kessel23]

Are you sure that they are hawks?

 

[centrarchid]

Thanks everyone. I dont know much about hawks so I dont really know what kind of hawk it is but I do know that it is all black and there are a couple of them that fly right over my yard. They even go really low to the ground around my chickens so I dont know why they have not tryed to get one yet but I will try everything I can to scare them off. Thanks so much for everyone's help

To get real help on this, post a picture of them. Species ID needed. Harris Hawk is only one I know of that is dark and moves around in groups.