Keeping hawks out

[Stephanie8806]

Hey there all! This week we lost two chickens to a hawk, both decapitated, one in the run and one in the coop through the chickens door. We are sure it was a hawk. Part of our run is going to be able to be completely closed off, but for the rest I’m entertaining several options for the other portion of the run. I’m here to see what actually works and what isn’t worth the time or money.

Our run has 9 foot high fencing, with no roof or barrier over the top apart from the branches of a MASSIVE Douglas fir that cover the open air part of the run(roughly 25’x18’). The tree is the reason we haven’t had hawk trouble until now, I think, as a hawk isn’t able to fly and dive like it normally does. Because of the steep grade of our landscape, heavy winter snowfall, and asymmetrical layout of the run, installing actual fencing or solid roof would be incredibly complicated and cost prohibitive.

We are going to be hanging aviary netting of some sort, but I have also been reading that reflective tape products and owl decoys can have a decent effect on deterring birds of prey. Have you had luck with any of these methods, or any others?

We live in the mountains, the coop is off grid, the coop itself is extremely well built and only needs a change in location of the chicken door to become essentially bear proof. And although not ramshackle, the run is a bit more of a little rustic construct. We do free range our birds and have never had problems. I’m about as “okay” as one can be with the idea that sometimes predation is going to happen, but I’m annoyed that it happened in the run, and simply infuriated that the coop became compromised. Just trying to do my best to keep their home sacred and increase the protection in their fenced run.

 

[aart]

owl decoys

 

[aart]

We have a lot of hawks here......so I did this from the get go, it was a good call:

 

[Alaskan]

I have never had a hawk eat the head.

Owls yes, they love heads. Or at least the great horned owls that have entered the coop through the pop door, happily ate heads.

I have had predation from bald eagles, a coopers hawk, some other hawk, and a falcon tried. None of those ever touched the head.

The coopers hawk was scary since it was perched in the low branches of a spruce. It just jumped from the low branch onto a cockerel and tore off the side of his chest... at which point I ran up and interrupted. Supposedly that is what cooper hawks do... hide in low branches.

All of the rest of the hawks and eagles killed by diving down from the sky... except for a couple of bald eagles....

once a bald eagle actually flew down through the ONE 2x2 foot hole in the wire roof, and then hopped over to try to kill a duck.

And twice an eagle flew down, then hopped into my run (through the propped open people door, open for free range time) and ate a few chickens and ducks.

I have also had one hawk or eagle... can't remember now... bust through the fishnet top to try and kill a chicken. Busting through the net reduced the impact, and I saw it happen and ran and stopped before further injury happened.

One eagle tried the same thing and got tangled in the net, we had to free it.

So......

I now have that concrete reinforcing wire on the top of all of my runs.

It has huge holes, so a raccoon could crawl in... but eagles and hawks don't get it. The huge holes mean it doesn't hold much snow, it is very ridged so needs only minimal support and a snow load doesn't bust it.

If you don't want to go that way...

Fishnet tops are good until the snow tears them down... and string with surveyors tape hung along like streamers does greatly reduce arial predation.

But not with Owls... they could care less and are very Freddy Krueger-esk.

 

[marylou442]

I live on a beautiful piece of private property surrounded by national forest on top of a mountain. I have had chickens for 4 years. Our forest is loaded with Hawks but they have never killed any of our chickens. Our 3 coups are right next to our log home and both home, greenhouse and coups are built up against a large hill in somewhat of a circle. Our coops are surrounded by mountain lion proof sturdy metal chain link fencing and our chickens have plenty of room to hang out in their large open air and sunny yard that is only accessible for hawks and predators from one small segment of the large circle. The hawks soon figured out that they can not swoop down into the chicken yard without slamming into the side of the mountain!

Having the coops etc. close to our cabin is very helpful because we can hear disturbances right away. A few weeks after we put our chickens in their new home, I was having my morning tea and I heard Mr. Peepers not crowing but almost screaming at the top of his lungs ( Mr. Peepers is my very first rooster that I hatched myself...I named him Mr. Peepers because when he hatched he was wet and mad and peep, peep peeped non stop until I was able to warm him up in a towel with a gentle blow dryer.) He was my very first hatch ever and I didn't know they all react that way at birth...okay back to the story.... I heard Mr. Peepers crowing in a strange bellowing blast , almost like the horn on an old time antique jalopy/horseless carriage . It definitely got my attention! I ran out in my nightgown to see what was going on and across our road was a fairly large, growling Bobcat on one side of our dirt driveway and Mr. Peepers on the other side of the driveway; puffed up 3 time bigger than normal with all the hens lined up 2 by 2 behind him. It was definitely a standoff between Mr. Peepers and the Big Bad Bobcat. I ran down the outside ramp ( half naked!) waving my arms and screaming at the top of my lungs and throwing every hand sized rock I could pick up, at the salivating bobcat. Finally, after what seemed like 15 to 20 minutes of Mr. Peepers bellowing and me screaming and throwing rocks at this bobcat, he finally turned around and slowly started walking back up his side of the hill. After taking about 10 steps, he turned around and took one long last look at me and Mr. Peepers. I could tell he was thinking to himself..."Maybe I could take them both out and get those juicy, clueless hens after all".....so Mr. Peepers and I both screamed at him even harder and I threw bigger rocks and Mr. Peepers puffed up his chest so much bigger I was worried he would burst himself!!

Finally, with complete disgust, that bobcat turned back around and slowly went up the hill and disappeared and never looked back AND never came back either. That was our one and only bobcat incident and it was 10 years ago! Word gets around fast in a small mountain village not only with the residents but apparently the predator population as well!

Mr. Peepers began strutted around the yard like a proud, handsome soldier coming home from war, surrounded by adoring and grateful hens and I went back to my cold tea and almost passed out from the realization that I could have easily been eaten or at least severely thrashed by a very large bobcat! After I threw up what little breakfast I had left in my stomach, I thanked God for extending grace and protection to brave Roosters and crazy chicken ladies....can I get an AMEN!!

 

[lutza]

Interesting thread! We're in a Midwest suburb and have had a few different hawk visits and even a bald eagle circling nearby. A hawk once buzzed my head as it bailed out of low hanging spruce branch near the run. Anyway, before we got our chickies we started noticing the different squirrel noises when a hawk was around - there's a sort of warning cry they send out. Then I noticed the bluejays have some particular behaviors as well when hawks are near. Now with chickens in the yard, every time I hear the bluejays, I go to check on the chickens. If they're not hiding, they are usually super alert, heads high, and like statues. So then I will throw shelled peanuts on the shed roof near the chicken run. The bluejays love it and hang out for a bit. I'm also hoping to attract crows. Crows and bluejays are fearless when it comes to chasing away hawks. So, either I'm building an army of hawk-chasers or the jays are playing me for free peanuts. We'll see.

 

[aart]

I bet he was really confused

Frustrated for sure....have seen a few bounce off hard, like thy never saw the mesh.
Fox and coyote bounced off walls too.

 

[Missmaddymoo008]

Hi. Although I live in a place where there are LOTS of hawks. A roof netting will definitely help, just make sure it’s sturdy and won’t collapse easily. If you have a rooster, roosters help alert hens. Add a lot of shady or hide-out spots for them. And Make sure their aren’t any nests or big trees nearby where you plan to move the main coop. Cause a hawk could easily camp out right next to a coop. My personal opinion is not to get decoys, cause that could just attract more predators. Lastly, lock your coop up at night and open on late morning, this helps with owls, if you worry about them also.

 

[Missmaddymoo008]

Well we aren’t moving the coop, just moving the chicken door to the other side of the coop to where it can be in the portion that we can completely enclose. The coop does get closed and locked at night. It’s very secure. The hawk entered through the chickens access door in the middle of the day to kill the second chicken. Cant exactly close their door all day.

I’m personally not convinced adding hiding spots will help much. Our entire 8x10 coop is elevated, about 24 inches off the ground, and the first chicken was killed under the coop and the hawk drug her out into the run to eat her head.

The netting will certainly be secured well. No worries there. That’s interesting about owls attracting other predators... how does that work? I hear owls and hawks are natural enemies, and I would think things like weasels would avoid birds of prey?

At one time we had an owl decoy outside our run and couple days after there was a hawk sitting right next to it. I don't know if it knew if it was fake or what. That's just my personal story on decoys. And I did misunderstand your original post, sorry. And I didn't know that hawks would actually drag a chicken out of a coop, most of the time ( at least with me ) the hawk would never make a kill unless it was in a open space where it could grab-and-go.
Sorry

 

[Stephanie8806]

I will try to respond to more of you, this thread has been busy over the holiday! I will include some pictures below of our run now.

All options considered, we decided to go with topping the run with aviary netting. I couldn’t find any locally, but I was referred to an orchard and vineyard supply warehouse in the area. I ended up getting “extra heavy duty” netting, that has five eights inch openings. It is primarily used for keeping birds away from fruit. Although it says extra heavy duty, it’s very lightweight. But, throughout the course of installation, it snagged on several sharp surfaces and didn’t even fray. We folded it in half, attached it to the roof of the coop, and sort of pulled it over the run like a bedsheet. It overhangs the fence on all sides by a generous amount, and is secured well. I can’t imagine a bird being able to get through it, especially since there are two layers. Anything would get tangled before it got through. some thing that worried me about netting with larger openings, was potential risk for a chicken getting tangled in it. The nice thing about the five eights openings is that they are too small to fit a chicken head. And, since our fence posts are 10 feet high, the lowest area of netting right now is only about 8 feet. A chicken would have to fly up, flip upside down, and get her feet tangled in the netting to get stuck.

Although we do get a good amount of snow in this area, I am not too concerned. Their run is covered by a gigantic Douglas fir tree, and it protects the ground from heavy snowfall. For reference, we got 8 inches one day, and there was barely an inch on the ground in the run. If snow accumulation ever did start to become a problem however, it seems like it would be just as easy as knocking it loose with a broom handle and letting it fall through.

Since putting up the netting, we haven’t had any more problems. We do have plans to include a more permanent partial enclosure inside the run, directly off the side of the coop, but that will likely have to wait until spring.

The girls egg production has dropped off significantly, and the stress also caused one of our chickens to throw a late molt. Not ideal timing, as we are starting to get into the coldest part of the year! But, they seem to be recovering overall. Still a little gun shy, even nervous to approach me, but that is to be expected.

As you can see from the picture below, our property has quite a grade to it. I made them a little roost in the middle of the run when it was built, almost right in the middle. Since the base is a 6 x 6 post buried in the ground, we are going to drill a hole into it and anchor in a patio umbrella. This will help support the netting in the middle, as well as give the girls extra protection from sun and precipitation. The nice thing about the umbrella too, is that we will be able to crank it down if it’s windy, or to empty it of snow. I will add a picture here once we do that. Hoping to get that done next week(after payday).