South Beach Hawk Attack

[richardtheman]

Hi Everyone...

Well, I had my first official Hawk Attack today. Boy that was scary!

Ok, My normal routines with my birds are the following:

1.) Leave them in the coop, and only fly late after noons before dark to prevent hawk attacks. Always watch my birds, when they are set free to help in case of predators.

2.) Clean Coop thoroughly every weekend and spray it with bleach mix to kill germs.

3.) Provide my birds with Borax in Bath water every other day.

4.) Spray my babies with bug spray and also apply seven dust on the bottom of coop.

Well, since I live in South Florida and hardly ever see hawks... I cheated today. I have an odd group of birds. 1st of all, in my back yard if you look up on the power lines of the neighborhood, you will see several doves, parrots and etc... They are plentiful! One of my neighbor have a few pigeons and many doves. Well, they never seem to bother me or create any problems since they do not come over my house and mingle with my birds. My birds also do the same, they never mingle with my neighbor pigeons, they only stay together.


Ok, so all my birds are happy.... I mean, I have successful at re-homing at least 10 birds . Reti and Abisai gave me a few, and they just love it here and never leave. I mean, you can view the previous posts and you will see their pics.


Ok, so today I wanted to perform a deep cleaning of my coops. So, I open the door and most of my birds flew out. Usually, when they go out they only stretch for 1 hour or two and just hang around on top of the coop. For some odd reason, they never fly.... except for one young feral I have. In any rate, I have a two year old daughter; so I decided to just hang outside with her and clean my birds while she plays in the corner of my back yard.

OK, once I am done cleaning and spraying... I then elected to place the food for my birds so they can eat and get back inside.

The mistake I made, was that I did this around 12 noon. BIG MISTAKE!!!!! Ok, as I am hanging with my daughter waiting for all the birds to go back in, a HUGE red bird hovered over me and I mean HUGE!!!! It was very silent and quick. I yelled and said to my self- "oh my God, so this is what they call a HAWK ATTACK!" I just frooze and yelled so my birds can escape. It happened so fast! Well, in a blink of an eye, all my birds that were outside disappeared! I did see the hawk chasing one of the white one around. I thought she was dead for sure. She is very young and I h ave never seen her fly until today. Ok, so all my neighbor birds took off also when they saw the hawk. I guess, they were all warning each other. I was in shock and was very sad. I didn't see any of my birds anymore. The ones in the coop were safe and sound however. I have a few nesting and some others who just don't like leaving the coop.

Ok, so hours go by and I was so sad and thought for a fact that my birds were the Hawk's Lunch! Ok, I was so sure of this since the hawk was flying only 2 feet away from one of my young white pigeons.

So, as time go by, I looked way up in the sky... I saw a white dot hoovering in the sky above my house. For some reason, it would not land. This bird was way up! So, I have like 7 birds out. AS luck may have it, one by one they all returned except for one. I was very happy that they survived but yet sad that I lost a bird.

Ok, so hours later, I went to talk to my neighbor, and guess who came back? Yes, my young white pigeon came back!!! So, this meant I lost no birds and all my birds out wit a HAWK!! I was so happy. I open the door, and he immediately went inside. None of my birds got hurt, they were in perfect condition like nothing happened!

I guess although they were not exposed to hawks, they just have that natural instinct to take off when they see one. But, to my surprise...they are faster than I would have ever imagine. I mean, they disappeared at a blink of an eye.


Next time , I will surely stick to my routine and try not to deviate from the norm. What kind of hawk was this? Huge, and the feathers were like dark red. Come to think of it, I think this was my first time seeing a bird like this.

[Victor]

It is something you will never forget.

Your pigeons were very lucky.

I am glad they eventually returned. I bet they were scared.

[Trees Gray]

I'm glad your birds are all back. Be very careful.

It's not the big red hawks that you really need to worry about-they are not as savy as the Cooper hawks, they are worse.

[Charis]

Originally Posted by Trees Gray

I'm glad your birds are all back. Be very careful.

It's not the big red hawks that you really need to worry about-they are not as savy as the Cooper hawks, they are worse.

And the Peregrine Falcons.

[Grim]

I would guess it was a coopers hawk, I have seen red tail hawks go after pigeons as well but seem to be no match for their speed.

Keep in mind it is averaged that a hawk has only a 20% chance to make a successful kill when targeting a fit bird. The odds are in your birds favor.

[Maggie-NC]

Richard, I'm happy your birds came back safely.

Your hawk could have been a red shouldered or red tail hawk. Both of these are considered medium sized hawks with the red shouldered being the smaller of the two but they both look pretty big to me. They don't normally seem to be that interested in our pigeons. We have a pair of red shouldered hawks who feed in our back yard during the winter (food we put out for the crows) and never go after the birds or squirrels. Sometimes I believe "our" hawks actually keep the small hawks away from our yard.

The small ones are the more dangerous ones - like the Cooper's and Sharp Shinned.

[LokotaLoft]

yes its the little hawks that you have to worry about more so and remember they can only get one at a time but they always come back for more ..

[richardtheman]

Originally Posted by LokotaLoft

yes its the little hawks that you have to worry about more so and remember they can only get one at a time but they always come back for more ..

So, since he didn't get any, will he try to come again? I guess I will not let my birds out for a while. I never saw mu birds fly until that day. I was also shock to see some had the ability to fly up so high. I think I saw a cooper once before way up in the sky getting chased down by crows. Do you guys think this might of been a falcon? The bird was pretty big and all of this happened so fast! All I remember is the silence and the speed my birds used to take off.

[Margarret]

I am SO GLAD your birds all got back safely. It is scary for both your birds and you to have a hawk after them. It sounds like it was probably a red tailed hawk you saw from the color you describe. This is a Cooper's hawk. This one, a female I think from her size, would come sit on the fence where we used to live and stare at the aviary. We would run her off, but she was extremely determined. One of these even grabbed a bird right through the wire one day so that my aviary is now double wired with a space between. This was in the middle of the city( greater LA), not out in the country where we now live.

Margaret

[Charis]

Originally Posted by Margarret

I am SO GLAD your birds all got back safely. It is scary for both your birds and you to have a hawk after them. It sounds like it was probably a red tailed hawk you saw from the color you describe. This is a Cooper's hawk. This one, a female I think from her size, would come sit on the fence where we used to live and stare at the aviary. We would run her off, but she was extremely determined. One of these even grabbed a bird right through the wire one day so that my aviary is now double wired with a space between. This was in the middle of the city( greater LA), not out in the country where we now live.

Margaret

Quite an amazing picture, Margaret.
The Birds of Prey are everywhere. Most people just aren't used to noticing them. Probably the same folks that don't know the difference between a Pigeon and a Crow.

[feralpigeon]

That is a good picture, Margarfet. Richard, I'm glad that your birds all trapped in safely and hope that you never have a resident Cooper's hawk!

fp

[Reti]

Goodness, Richard your birds and you were very lucky.
We have tons of hawks down here, you don't always see them, but they are out there.
When I had my balcony pigeons I always had someone "dissapear", especially babies from nests, but also Angel's parents, at least one of them disseapeared after an attack. And I rarely saw the hawks, only twice I saw mr. Cooper. Beautiful but scary bird.

Reti

[SkyofAngels]

So scary, this is why my birds are house pigeons. I bought them because I wanted to start a dove release but I am too scared to let them fly outside I can't take losing one. So now my husband keeps saying when are you gonna train those birds over and over and I'm like NO MY BIRDIES. I feel kinda bad I bet they would like to go out but I keep seeing hawks and eagles around me so I get scared. I know this field near my moms house I wonder if I could train them to fly around for a little while and then go back into the crate or something, if I could train them to that then I could do the dove release but instead of them having to fly all the way back to the loft and possibly meet a hawk they could just fly to the crate in the parking lot or something. Anyone know how I could do that? I would really like to know. It would get my husband off my back

[richardtheman]

Originally Posted by Reti

Goodness, Richard your birds and you were very lucky.
We have tons of hawks down here, you don't always see them, but they are out there.
When I had my balcony pigeons I always had someone "dissapear", especially babies from nests, but also Angel's parents, at least one of them disseapeared after an attack. And I rarely saw the hawks, only twice I saw mr. Cooper. Beautiful but scary bird.

Reti

WOW, this was like the first time I really notice them. I mean, I have been living here most of my life and have always had a fancy for birds. I never notice them before. Used to think only cats were the problems. Boy was I wrong.... Now, when I look outside after the attack I am so paranoid looking everywhere thinking a hawk is hiding in the bush somewhere. Oh well, at least I got experience now. Which hawk is more abundant here in South Florida?


The funny thing is, I never saw my birds fly not even once! They farthest they would go i on the power line above my coop. Now, this hawk comes by and they were took off like rockets. I mean, they were way up in the sky looking like white dots.

[Reti]

I think the most abundant hawks here in downtown are the Cooper's, not sure but that is what I saw.

Your birds are smart and have good instincts. And I am so glad they are strong and good flyers.

Reti