I hate Hawks!! *rant*

[Ol'FashionHen]

... I really hate them...my chooks love to free range and I let them everyday. I am currently re-thinking letting them out

. I have lost 2 laying hens and now just the day before yesturday 3 - 6 wo roos my Sophie hatched.

...yes that's right 3. I was out yesturday afternoon in my garden and let them out (cause I was right there) and maybe ...just maybe 15 minutes went by and there were 4 hawks circleing the premises

, so I had to bribe them with buttermilk to get them to come back in...then the hawks went away. I already have cd's hanging around and a fake scarecrow lady that I move every few days. Will a big fake owl do the trick? They already have a pretty big run but DH is supposed to make a bigger one soon so they can free range in big area with plenty of grass...but still it will be too big to cover, has anyone else found a good solution to this problem....I never lost one chook last year... so why all of a sudden are these hawks showing up?

 

[NotTheMomma]

I don't know the solution!

This is the first year we've had chickens. Mine are in an uncovered 20'x30' run, and I let them free range in the evenings. I'd leave them out all day, but my dogs don't play well.

Anyway, I put two Igloo dog houses in the run, and when ANY bird flies overhead, mine run into either the coop, or the dog houses, which ever they are nearest. While free ranging, they'll run UNDER something. Sometimes a chair, under the coop, into the dog houses, under a vehicle, etc., but so far, they've managed to escape being caught by whatever is flying overhead. Now a few blue jays are being stupid, and flying into my chicken's run! The chickens actually chase them out.

And I'm so stupid, I don't know what a hawk sounds like. I've seen one, or what I thought was one flying one day. And we found one dead on the side of the road that someone had hit. But when I'm outside, I hear all kinds of birds singing, so I odn't know if one is a hawk.

 

[Crystalchic]

i so badly wanna free range my birds. but for a few reasons i cant. one is that i have to keep them segregated from each other because of breeding .
i cant let them out bye groups because we are loaded with red tail hawks
and my neighbors dog is a killer

 

[CMV]

I think it takes hawks a while to realize that the chickens are there. Once they figure it out, though, they pay a lot closer attention to the area the chickens were seen. I never had problems with hawks before this year, but now that they've realized we are here I can't get rid of them. I actually caught one walking (yes, walking) around my coop trying to figure out how to get at the chickens inside. My birds' free range time has been cut way back in an effort to save their lives.

 

[mediazeal]

The closer we are to nature (free range) the closer nature is to us.

I'm telling myself when you decide on quality of life, meaning they get to free range, there are going to be risks and probably occassional loses.

I keep trying to figure out how to best protect the chickens but let them have some out of the coop/covered run so they can get to places to dig, scratch and forage.

Besides supervising them when they are out, I've read so many posts saying hawks have attacked just feet away even when supervised.

A rooster is apparently your best defense
A dog if he is protective of you chickens (mine would be the predator unfortunately)
And lots of places to duck under for cover. I have tons of rose bushes to hide under in half the yard and I will put chairs and maybe some netting on poles over sections of the large grass area.
Anything to give them a chance to help themselves.

 

[wundernurse]

The only way mine are free ranging in my yard is when I am right there with them (like 2 feet away). My dogs stay close to them (waiting for poop--yuck) and hopefully a hawk will think twice. I lost 2 to hawks earlier this year. I was in the yard with them, but far away. After that mine stayed in for a couple months until the hawks forgot about us, but right after I lost my 2, the hawks were there everyday for a few weeks. There is no easy solution...

 

[Crystalchic]

i have read so many horror stories rite here in byc about hawks getting chicks with an adult standing rite there
they said that the hawk just swooped down rite in front of her and grabbed her free ranging chick that was only out for a little while
i read another post where the hawk destroyed the chick by trying to pull it out of the cage bars
hawks will take mice squirrels and other small critters
i lost a few two years to hawks
i believe that a chickens worse enemy is the neighbors dog

 

[Ol'FashionHen]

I have lots of places for my chooks to hide...bushes, porch, lean to, dog house, keep weeds tall a few feet behind chicken house....but they are taken just feet away from the chicken house...I'm sure they were runnning to hide when the hawks got them. Like I said this last time 3 of my 6wo chicks were taken ... the first two taken were full grown laying pullets

And yesturday evening when my DH and I were working outside here came four hawks...circeling again

. My chooks were out only because three had flown out of the run and I knew there would be no way I could have gotten them to go back in with out the rest trying to shove out. Not to mention I'm tired of cleaning the poop off my porch everyday and now they are attaching my roses.

. I do have a roo, and he does signal the ladies when hawks are around. But

...I'm on the hunt for hawk protection ...I have two neighbors with chickens too but no reports of hawks getting them.

 

[Fredster]

Quote:
Very true.

When we moved our chickens to their current yard (about 2.5 acres fenced, mostly open field), we started losing chickens to hawks quickly.

So I put some more nature out there with them, and haven't lost one since.

 

[LynneP]

We can't free range and two properties down from us a neighbour lost most of his free-range hens to migrating and nesting hawks over the past 10 days. Hawks wil actually nest near free-rangers to raise their young.

What about aviary netting for that big run, though?