Defending Chickens from Predators


Hawk wings left imprints in the snow along with Leghorn feathers and signs of a scuffle.
The weather yesterday was beautiful with lots of sun and temps in the 50's, so we decided to let our chickens out of their enclosed run into our backyard. That's where our chickens love to be, since they've been raised free-range. Just as I let them out; however, I noticed two red tail hawks circling overhead. (I know I said I'd tell you how we lost chickens and this is one of those stories. We had two chickens taken by hawks last year - an ameracauna and a white leghorn. We also had a near-miss with a white leghorn over the winter. In fact, I've attached a picture of the feather marks (and leghorn feathers) left in the snow by our arial predator.) Aware of the danger, I also didn't want to deny the chickens a great day of foraging. So, I decided to break out our halloween scarecrows and put them in visible spots throughout the yard. This worked really well and I plan to keep moving the scarecrows to fool the hawks further. Wish me luck!

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