What to do about hawks?

[Hokum Coco]

It is not my objective to have a penned up flock of doves and pigeons. These are wild birds I am capturin. My objective is to train them to live on my farm and my pen is just a temporary place to keep them so they can establish a habit of where to sleep and get food and water. It was actually quite easy to train them. What I did not realize is that their cooing would atract hawks like a screeming rabbit would attract a pack of starving coyotes. My problem is bigger then just doves though. I have worked for years trying to improve tje local habitate to increase the quail and rabbit population on my land with very little success. I now understand why. What I need is creative ways to keep the hawks at bay. Land predators are not a problem because I can simply trap them if they become a problem. Not so with hawks.
My problem is not a hawk taking a dove now and then. My problem is that I could release a hundred birds and not a one of them would survive a week. There has to be a way to balance this out. I need to figure out what hawks are afraid of.

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Hawk are found around open fields especially near woodlots close to farms and cities. It is usually found in grasslands or marsh shrub habitats.[/FONT][FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif] Hawk have a lot of enemies some are, the great horned owl, the fox, the raccoon and the weasel. [/FONT]

Crows would help you. They have learned that 'mobbing' (the correct term) distracts the hawk so it can't hunt and generally so badly annoys the bird that it leaves the area. With a hawk gone, the crows are safer so they're really doing a 'neighborhood watch' which includes driving the 'undesireables' out of the neighborhood.

 

[Faith SL]

If you have lots of hawks in your local area, it is extremely difficult to get rid of them. Yes, crows (specifically ravens in my area, they are larger, smarter and more territorial) are a good natural resident to have hanging around, but get too many of them or a really smart member of their group and they could also become hostile towards your doves and pigeons, especially young doves and pigeons learning to fly.

You could also try placing hummingbird feeders out during spring and summertime. Those pugnacious little fluff balls are sometimes brave enough to attack smaller birds of prey like coopers and falcons, and although they don't do any damage of course they can be a real annoyance to the hawks.

Some pigeon fanciers have said that hanging CDs in trees around the loft or attaching them on the loft roof helps deter hawks, but I have never tried this myself.

 

[Jungleexplorer]

CDs! That just might work. I have a ton of them. It's worth a try.

 

[Ntsees]

You've stated you lost 30 doves/pigeons in a matter of 3 days and making the claim that it was hawks/owls. It doesn't sound right because I've never heard of hawks killing in those numbers in such a short amount of time. Also, an area shouldn't support more than a handful of hawks. Have you actually seen a hawk swoop in to take your birds? I'm not saying that hawks didn't kill any of your birds. Hawks may have taken a few of your birds, but I think you are dealing with ground predators when losses come out that high.

I'm sorry for your losses, but unfortunately, it comes with the territory when birds are free-ranged.

 

[laughingdog]

great horned owls, goshawks, (two really good other BOP haters and will kill other hawks like other BOPs kill pigeons, as super territorial and aggressive, but never saw them go for pigeons when other prey available, though you may notice decline in red foxes, skunks, opossums, coons, cats, and snakes, and had pleasure of working with in falconry for years), ravens and crows, dogs trained to be nice to pigeons stay around coop and chase off or kill the predators (my dogs and and extra cockerels worked well in past trained and kept with pidgys and doves would alert to, fend off, and kill BOPs). cheap orchard, or deer plastic/rubber netting around outside of coop with line or metal ware attached to to make a racked when hit by BOPs, tends to scare them off when they go for your birds in coop. paintball guns also work well to give them a blast but not actually do any damage other than maybe sore or hurt pride and paint on them thats easier to see then count how many you have attacking your birds.

good luck! and keep us updated on everything.

 

[Hokum Coco]

Laughing dog is right on the money when mentioning hawks prefer mammals as compared to birds. Hawks would prefer a snake over a bird. Times have to be tough when they kill one of their own kind for food. Peregrines are another story!

 

[Jungleexplorer]

You've stated you lost 30 doves/pigeons in a matter of 3 days and making the claim that it was hawks/owls. It doesn't sound right because I've never heard of hawks killing in those numbers in such a short amount of time. Also, an area shouldn't support more than a handful of hawks. Have you actually seen a hawk swoop in to take your birds? I'm not saying that hawks didn't kill any of your birds. Hawks may have taken a few of your birds, but I think you are dealing with ground predators when losses come out that high.

I'm sorry for your losses, but unfortunately, it comes with the territory when birds are free-ranged.

I have several game cams around my land to monitor game and predator populations and traffic. I also have a large free range chicken flock, so I have to keep tabs on what's living in my area. I know ever land predator that passes through my land. If I lose a chicken to a predator that is just passing through, I don't worry about it. But when I a land predator (fox, bobcat etc) that starts living on my land and starts taking bird regularly, well, it has to be sorted out. I have two game cams that monitor my pigeon pen. I know exactly what what is killing my birds. It was hawks. Since most of the birds were killed after I set them free and there were killed while up in the trees during the days time, I would find it difficult to blame that on anything other then hawks. And I yes I actually saw the the hawks kill some of my birds and chased them off.

 

[Jungleexplorer]

Laughing dog is right on the money when mentioning hawks prefer mammals as compared to birds. Hawks would prefer a snake over a bird. Times have to be tough when they kill one of their own kind for food. Peregrines are another story!

I don't mean to disagree with both of you, but my personal experience has been very different then what is claimed by the experts, and I have video evidence to prove it. I have read many things about the small hawks that inhabit my area and most of them claim that these hawks eat mostly reptiles and small rodents. But my recent experience has shown that the hawks around my area love doves and pigeons as much as a bear loves honey. I have no doubt I could release a bunch of birds right now and they make would not make until dark. So either the hawks in my area are just an anomaly or the consensus view is incorrect.

We are getting off track here. This thread is not about whether hawks are eating my birds; this is an established fact that would hold up in a court of law. It seems like every time I start a thread about predator control it ends up in some ideological debate with a bunch of people defending the predators and making me seem evil for wanting to protect my livestock. I want to stop this right now. I came here looking for proactive creative legal ways to deal with this situation. Ideas like the CD idea. The crow idea is fine, fine but it seems doubtful that I could realistically accomplish such a thing since I rarely see crows or ravens anywhere in this region. As far as great horned owls, they are my worst enemy because they have killed more of my chickens by far then any other predator. I have actually thought about designing telephone pole spikes and paying the electric company to put them on top of all the telephone poles around my property to keep those dumb birds from landing on them. It is my theory that the tall telephone poles give them a perfect observation point from which they can locate my birds. If they could not land on the poles around my property, my theory is that would fly to poles that were father away and they would be less likely to see my birds. It's just a theory though. But it is these kinds of ideas that I am looking for.

 

[Hokum Coco]

Your only option in my mind is to keep your pigeons prisoner in a secure confine until you get your predator problem resolved. Through some or all of the things mentioned. This could be just a bad time of year where all kinds of hawks are migrating now and the population may be at an all time high in your area. Good luck Jungleexplorer keep us posted on your progress.

On another note a pair of white homing pigeons laid an egg today. It should hatch December 28th in a perfect world. I am in Canada with an uninsulated baby barn and never add extra heat. I hope these soon to be parents know what they are doing. I may end up with squabcicles.

 

[albert w]

Maybe locking your birds up for one month would force the hawks and falcons to move on. Then start flying them again. At the first hawk attack, lock them up for a couple weeks.