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Depends on the weather, sadly: there will be the resident Red Tails and Coopers all winter, and they will be unlikely to take after your chickens if they haven't already. If we're talking about the Fred Meyer's on Bridgeport Way, that Red Tail has a nesting territory at the golf course; there's also a pair of Cooper's Hawks that nest over by Curtis (we used to go to the Trader Joe's on Bridgeport Way; anywhere I go more than a few times, I've scoped out the resident Red Tails and Coopers at least, also Ospreys (the closest to you is at Gravelly Lake) and Bald Eagles (They nest somewhere inland from the mouth of Chambers Creek but not too far from the New Tacoma Cemetary).
However, if there's hard weather north of us all winter, we'll have Fraser River vagrants, and they are the ones to worry about. Arctic outbreaks that drive lots of snow all the way to southern Puget Sound push the hungry travellers south of us, and out to the ocean beaches, so there's times right before and right after that you'll see more migrants- especially down at shoreline below you. Blue freezes are worst for places like the Kent Valley and Nisqually Delta- the travellers like to hunt open spaces more than forests.
If it stays damp and breezy, you just have to worry about the residents, and that not very much- there's a lot of prey species habitat where you are, and unless you're close to a roost tree (which I suspect is the source of hallerlake's eagle problem, although I'm yet to figure out where that bird is perching) where they can drop out of the sky in a moment when they're just bored or hungry enough to risk close human encounters, you shouldn't have any active attempts at predation. I watched the resident Red Tail here ignore the heck out of my cousin's free ranging chickens all last year and as recently as today- the only attempted bird predation here was that one migrant Coops earlier this fall.
There's a nest over by Bitter Lake. Sometimes the eagles fly over us on their way between Haller Lake and Bitter lake.
Depends on the weather, sadly: there will be the resident Red Tails and Coopers all winter, and they will be unlikely to take after your chickens if they haven't already. If we're talking about the Fred Meyer's on Bridgeport Way, that Red Tail has a nesting territory at the golf course; there's also a pair of Cooper's Hawks that nest over by Curtis (we used to go to the Trader Joe's on Bridgeport Way; anywhere I go more than a few times, I've scoped out the resident Red Tails and Coopers at least, also Ospreys (the closest to you is at Gravelly Lake) and Bald Eagles (They nest somewhere inland from the mouth of Chambers Creek but not too far from the New Tacoma Cemetary).
However, if there's hard weather north of us all winter, we'll have Fraser River vagrants, and they are the ones to worry about. Arctic outbreaks that drive lots of snow all the way to southern Puget Sound push the hungry travellers south of us, and out to the ocean beaches, so there's times right before and right after that you'll see more migrants- especially down at shoreline below you. Blue freezes are worst for places like the Kent Valley and Nisqually Delta- the travellers like to hunt open spaces more than forests.
If it stays damp and breezy, you just have to worry about the residents, and that not very much- there's a lot of prey species habitat where you are, and unless you're close to a roost tree (which I suspect is the source of hallerlake's eagle problem, although I'm yet to figure out where that bird is perching) where they can drop out of the sky in a moment when they're just bored or hungry enough to risk close human encounters, you shouldn't have any active attempts at predation. I watched the resident Red Tail here ignore the heck out of my cousin's free ranging chickens all last year and as recently as today- the only attempted bird predation here was that one migrant Coops earlier this fall.
There's a nest over by Bitter Lake. Sometimes the eagles fly over us on their way between Haller Lake and Bitter lake.
