Discouraging hawks?

[Mr. 16 gauge]

Bought some homing pigeons to train my Lab puppy with the other day; I currently am holding them in my quail pen while I build a coop for them. Had a big, old Cooper's hawk come and land on the pen the other day (he can't get too them).
What can I do to discourage him and get him to go elsewhere? I can't legally shoot him, but is there something I can do to get him to go elsewhere? I really didn't buy these homers to give him an easy meal.
I won't be flying them for a few months, do I do have some time, if that is what it takes.
Thanks in advance.................

[Larryjk]

A pellet rifle generally discourages hawks from coming back.

[Nulle]

Not a good idea if ya get turned in. That hawk could get Very costly by the time the Feds get done with you. There are some devices out there that are supposed to deter them and I will check today and see what they are called.

[skeet]

To heck with the pellet rifle. Shotgun the sucker. I know..I know..protected etc but they are fair game if they are depredating.. Sounds good huh??

[Larryjk]

Nulle, I know the facts of life on hawks, eagles, etc. I used to have aspen trees on my yard that the deer were killing. I told the game warden I was going to shoot them in the arse with rock salt for doing that. She said she would arrest me for shooting in twon and harrassing wildlife. I told her she didn't understand; that I had no intention of inviting her to watch. I think the same would apply to shooting a hawk in the rear end with a pellet gun --- or a shotgun as Skeet suggests.

[buckhunter]

In Mass if wildlife is killing crop or livestock you are entitled to kill it. Had a farmer kill a cougar (they swear they aint here)last year. They are protected from hunting but because he was killing livestock he was justified. In fact the warden helped him.

Just a wag but suspect the Feds would frown on it.

[popplecop]

Do yourself a huge favor and DO NOT SHOOT THE HAWK! Why not cover the top of the pen with some plastic tarps. Pigeon coops that I've seen have solid roofs. Another thing I'd suggest that you go on the webb to both the state and federal authorites for help with your problem. Also homeing pigeon raisers probably have a wealth of info.

[Mr. 16 gauge]

I live in suburbia, so even if I wanted to shoot said hawk (I don't, for reasons I'll get to in a minute), I couldn't......not to mention jepordizing my CCW, hunting privileges, ect.

I don't think a few pigeons in my yard would be considered "stock" by any judge, anywhere, and said hawk does provide a service by taking care of the squirrels and woodchucks that have decimated my garden in the past.

There is a top on the coop, so that idea won't work....checking out the pigeon fanciers websites is a good idea, however.
I was thinking about maybe stretching some chicken wire above the coop and hooking it up to a small battery to shock anything landing on it......not enough to cause death, but discourage it hanging around the pen. Then again, if my 'homers' try to land on it, they might get discouraged and fly elsewhere as well!:(

[skeet]

We used to have a few hawks that liked our chickens..big time. I ...discouraged them constantly..permanently. Then somebody stole 'em... they were kinda beautiful show type chickins. and too big for most of the hawks cept the Red Tails. and an occassional eagle. Must admit..never killed an eagle. Even the buzzards would kill a half grown chicken every now and then. They would hit 'em just like a hawk...or so it looked.

[jplonghunter]

Don't know for sure if this will eliminate the hawk,but set an owl decoy. If hawk is not intimidated the decoy will attract crows which will harass hawk.

jplonghunter

[Nulle]

Don't get me wrong I do not love hawks when it comes to game birds ect. BUT we are supposed to be Sportsmen on this site and a blatant disregard of the law is not a good example. Deer causing some problems and hawks are a total different story in the respect you will be dealing with local game wardens on the deer and the Feds and game wardens on the hawks.
Check the web and there are a ton of things out there you can use rather then guns and traps.

[skeet]

Nulle.. I kind of agree with you except for one thing..it used to be incumbent upon the SPORTSMEN of this country to shoot hawks and crows. When the use of DDT was banned to help them(hawks) recover there was wording put in the ESA to protect hawks and owls etc..even the common crow was given protection in the name of saving the mexican crow. I have never seen so many hawks as we have now. Crows either. Where I came from in Md the poor bobwhite quail had so many critters after them they really can't make a real comeback...even when they have good places to live breed and hide. The foxes were terrible there because they were protected by law. because I tried to control the predators of the quail I actually had 3 coveys on approx 40 acres of CReP land. That was 3 coveys more than the neighboring farmer had on his 260 acres next door to me. Sportsmans dollars are being wasted daily in the name of predators, from hawks to wolves. We withj our license dollars and other fees are paying for poor science to the detriment of game animals and birds as well as song birds etc. I really don't worry about the eagles but I have 5 Goldens that live on the cliff behind my house. That is a lot of Eagles in less than a square mile. If i had a little ankle biter i sure wouldn't let iut out around here. We had skwerls here but the little horned owls have wiped 'em out..prairie dogs too..on my place.. Do I want to wipe 'em out??..of course not..but we have wayyy too many predators now. And we surely didn't need the wolves that the do gooders gave us. They want 'em protected and they don't even live here.

[fabsroman]

Nulle.. I kind of agree with you except for one thing..it used to be incumbent upon the SPORTSMEN of this country to shoot hawks and crows. When the use of DDT was banned to help them(hawks) recover there was wording put in the ESA to protect hawks and owls etc..even the common crow was given protection in the name of saving the mexican crow. I have never seen so many hawks as we have now. Crows either. Where I came from in Md the poor bobwhite quail had so many critters after them they really can't make a real comeback...even when they have good places to live breed and hide. The foxes were terrible there because they were protected by law. because I tried to control the predators of the quail I actually had 3 coveys on approx 40 acres of CReP land. That was 3 coveys more than the neighboring farmer had on his 260 acres next door to me. Sportsmans dollars are being wasted daily in the name of predators, from hawks to wolves. We withj our license dollars and other fees are paying for poor science to the detriment of game animals and birds as well as song birds etc. I really don't worry about the eagles but I have 5 Goldens that live on the cliff behind my house. That is a lot of Eagles in less than a square mile. If i had a little ankle biter i sure wouldn't let iut out around here. We had skwerls here but the little horned owls have wiped 'em out..prairie dogs too..on my place.. Do I want to wipe 'em out??..of course not..but we have wayyy too many predators now. And we surely didn't need the wolves that the do gooders gave us. They want 'em protected and they don't even live here.

What we need is one heck of a balancing act, and we aren't very good at figuring it out. In Maryland, there is a pretty good problem with deer and resident canadian geese. Problem there is the lack of predation. Then, there is the lack of pheasants and quail in Maryland, and the problem there is over predation. On a farm I waterfowl hunt on, a trapper caught 21 foxes on 110 acres in less than a week. That is a lot of foxes.

I have seen an eagle by my place in Maryland, and I am nowhere near the Eastern Shore. I was shocked when I saw it, because I was outside with my daughter who was under 2 at the time and it made me realize that if the eagle had decided to grab her, there wouldn't be a thing I could do about it. It still makes me sick today to think about it. We have a couple pretty large foxes that run around our place and deer that come up to the cars and the front door. Ultimately, I think we are doing a piss poor job of game management, but that is just my opinion.

[skeet]

Hey Fabs..the only predators you have for deer in your area is cars..not nuff hunting to keep the deer in check..same with the geese. Not nufff hunting. The foxes are running rampant in many areas of Md because of the areas they have adapted themselves to...urban sprawl no hunting etc there either. Red foxes were not native to that area ya know..but people brought in the reds and the grays suffered badly. Man always seems to overdo things in the name of "conservation". We have wilderness areas here that are becoming sterile areas. You know the indians weren't the conservationists that they are portrayed as being. Know what a buffalo jump is?? They ran entire herds over a cliff to get the meat..Even an entire village couldn't eat a 100 buffalo. Man has always interacted with nature..changing the face of things. Even the Indians started fires ..hunted in what are now National parks..and in the name of saving critters we put them in jeopardy. Think I am pushing an agenda? Look at the history of Yellowstone. And the things that have gone wrong in the past are still happening..in the name of conservation. The largest herd of elk in a Park(approx 20,000) are now down to about 8,000..and there is no hunting in Yellowstone. Whatcha think has caused the loss of all the elk?..It's still man as the ultimate cause..some idiots turned loose a few wolves and simultaneously put wolves on the ESL.. Not only has it hurt the numbers in the yellowstone ecosystem..but for 100's of miles from there. Into Utah..Colorado even into eastern Montana and Washington(no not DC). I have wolves in my area pretty much constantly. Oh well..maybe one day somone will finally get it right

[Larryjk]

Skeet, Your figures are off a little. The 20,000 head of Yellowstone elk have dwindled to less than 5,000. And we are supposed to believe it is caused by "too much hunting" and the wolves in Yellowstone. I wasn't aware we could hunt in Yellowstone. (I am also tired of some folks blowing smoke up my jumper). IN the late 60s, the NPS was shooting elk in Yellowstone because there were too many. The BLM in Colorado took about 300 head and placed them on Waugh Moutain north of Cotopaxi and there are huntable numbers there today.
The BLM in Rawlins has placed hawk nesting structures in areas where the hawks had little nesting success because they were nesting on the ground. Where the nesting structures were installed the nesting success went up dramatically for a short time (2 to 3 years) and then plummeted because the hawks ate all of the prey animals. More playing God.
It has been pointed that the Mexican raven is protected and recent research has shown the Mexican raven is predating about 2/3 of the sage grouse nests. But we don't dare touch the ravens , and the official reason for sage grouse levels is the impacts of oil and gas drilling. More smoke up my jumper.

[Gil Martin]

On some of the buildings in town, the property owners put toy rubber snakes on the roof and the birds tend to stay away. Never tried it, but the folks I talked to say it works. I would prefer to put a few cats in the area. All the best...
Gil

[popplecop]

Skeet, I don't know how old you are but Raptors have been protected by Federal law since at least back in the 30s. The Great Horned Owl was the last raptor added in 1972 as I remember, the day of the "chicken hawk" is long gone and doubt if it will ever return. In the grand scheme of bird and small mamal populations raptors are not the reason for low populations. All we have to do is look in the mirror to find the culpirt.

[skeet]

Well I have advertisement from the 40's and 50's showing the sportsman taking aim at hawks etc..and I do remember hunters shooting hawks even in the 60's. And you are of course right..we should take the blame for the loss of habitat for the gamebirds etc in this country..but part of the blame lies right on the lack of reduction of predators. Not just hawks owls and foxes...All predators including possums coons feral cats and running free dogs. Unhappily..without a bit of help the quail didn't fair well on the CReP acres I had. After reducing all of the above..the critters rebounded beautifully. I even had a Horned owl in the mid 60's. Crows hated it..So I shot them to protect the owl. He was really hard to keep..feeding was time consuming. That owl hated everything. Finally turned him loose. He hung around home for the longest time

[Mr. 16 gauge]

On some of the buildings in town, the property owners put toy rubber snakes on the roof and the birds tend to stay away.

If I'm not mistaken, don't hawks EAT snakes? I might just be putting out a dinner invitation if I do that.:D

I've thought about putting out my owl decoy that I use for crow hunting, but I'm concerned that the pigeons might think it's real and not return!:(

I think what I will try is putting up a simple scare crow in the garden.....I'll try and move it around every few days, and hopefully it will keep the hawks away from my pigeons and the squirrels away from the sweet corn.

.....and while I am all for bringing back species from the edge of extinction, and reintroducing them into areas that they once inhabited, I think it is quite short sighted for the naturalist and goverment agencies that do so to not have a plan in place to deal with said critters when they rebound (and sometimes with a vengence) and cause problems. In addition the the raptors & wolves, don't forget the American alligator, which now takes a fair toll on people's pets, and have attacked humans as well......

[Nulle]

I started hunting in the 50's and you had better not shoot a hawk or owl in my state back then. Maybe the smarter people then me should change the laws and get some of these birds thinned out and I would be all for that. I swear everytime I see a hawk flying around in my grouse hunting area but I sure am not going to break the law and shoot it.
They do not help the upland population as with the fox but like was said "people" has caused more damage in upland populations then any of these critters.

[skeet]

The bald Eagle has been Federally protected since 1940 and the Golden since 1962. To the best of my Knowledge the hawks and owls etc were protected at a bit later time frame..at least federally. Think the last to be listed under the Migratory treaty or the ESL was the Great Horned owl

[Nulle]

I am betting on the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 and sent an email to the Fish and WIldlife Service and they are supposed to get back to me today.

[skeet]

[QUOTE=Mr. 16 gauge;340001]If I'm not mistaken, don't hawks EAT snakes? I might just be putting out a dinner invitation if I do that.:D

Hawks eak snakes for certain. I have seen many snakes taken by them. In particular one caught a very large black snake near my barn...a kinda pet snake I think. Most amazing thing about 'em is when they kill 'em they seem to not wriggle around very much like snakes do when humans kill 'em.. Don't know why. Heck I even saw a Kestrel catch and eat a garter snake. They are tiny falcons. I raised one of them one time..Fell off a grain elevator at our Skeet club. He didn't have 50 feathers on him when I found him. That bird would try to scare the heck outta people who came in the house. Also it was definitely not a vegan...He liked STEAK..chicken necks and hamburger. We kept him for more than a year. He would sit on our shoulders in the evening. Watch TV We got that darn bird in a local bird program and he learned to live in the wild. but every now and then he'd hit us up for some easy meals

[Nulle]

Had one of them little guys myself (dont tell the Feds lol) they are a neat bird.
Well speaking of Feds. they have not got back to me yet (not a supprise). I am darn curious myself about the hawk protection now. If nothing else we got this part of the site up and running again lol

[rainydays]

In our part of the state, the upland birds are getting hit hard by our ongoing severe weather. On the other hand the hawks are really fattening up on pheasants and grouse.:mad:

[Larryjk]

rainydays, Are the pheasants and grouse catching heck NE of Washburn? That is where I like to hunt in Oct. A winter that starts with wet snow on the vegetation that turns to ice followed by a few blizzards will give you a lot of dead birds. Really hate to see that happen.

[Larryjk]

skeet, I had a Cooper's hawk when I was a school kid in the early 50s. He was a real charmer, especially if you were dumb enough to stick your finger where he could get at it with beak or claw. Had him about 4 months and my mother turned him loose so she could stop doctoring my fingers. Beautiful little bird, but meaner than heck.

[skeet]

Larry..that little bird I had had manners with the family..with anyone else coming in the house he just had to try to scare 'em. Would fly through the house heading right at the visitor ..miss by inches every time. The horned owl had absolutely no manners.. I was a bit older and kept the fangers away. That owl was nasty. After shootin about 300 crows over him I turned him loose..caught all the rats on the place with traps and fed 'em to the owl..even killed a few skwerls and chipmunks. That sucker ate all of em. The horned owls around here have literally wiped out the (half tame) skwerls on the place here.. Coopers Hawks are fairly good size but they don't weigh much like most hawks..and that Horned owl wasn't nothing but feathers skin and bones...but still nasty and you really needed a leather cuff when ya carried him on your arm..Sharp feet. and ya needed him hooded too

[rainydays]

rainydays, Are the pheasants and grouse catching heck NE of Washburn? That is where I like to hunt in Oct. A winter that starts with wet snow on the vegetation that turns to ice followed by a few blizzards will give you a lot of dead birds. Really hate to see that happen.
I hate to say it, but the birds are really catching hell. Winter has been extremely relentless so far this winter. Well below zero again today and another 8" of snow. So far this winter we've had around 50" of snow and two days with temps. over 32 degrees and we are only just getting into February. I sure hope they get a break soon, but its not looking good for them. Oh, I went to HS in Washburn way back when. Some nice folks there.

[skeet]

Finally found the date that the hawks and owls were listed in the migratory treaty. It was 1972 or 1973....until that time there was no federal protection on hawks or owls other than the Bald(1940) and Golden eagles(1963). Some birds like the peregrine Falcon enjoyed ESL listing though. And there may have been some state laws protecting raptors

[Larryjk]

rainydays, I really hate to hear about the severe weather conditions for the pheasants and grouse. The people at Washburn are really nice folks and we always enjoy going there. Guess I better converse with our contact there before planning a hunt there next fall.

[Nulle]

Well guess I have to eat "crow" on that one lol We must have had some state law when I was growing up then. The Feds never did get back to me on the issue.

[Larryjk]

Skeet, You talked about a horned owl being feathers, skin and bone. When I was in college (1960) and finally got a 300 Weatherby, I had a plan to get the two horned owls who inhabitated the large cottonwoods in our back pasture on the farm. I had shot at them over a few years with the 06 and others but could never reach them. I got on the hilltop south of the trees and finally saw the birds, side by side on a large limb that I had a hole through the branches to see. I got prone and used my jacket for a forend rest and let fly on one of them. All I could see was feathers floating down and the other owl just swiveling its head to see what was going on. After I quit laughing, I lined up on the other one and sent it to its friend. I kicked myself in the butt a lot for ruining all of the fun I had over a few years trying to get them and then doing it all in two shots. I shot a lot of coyotes with that 300 Weatherby. 150 grain Silvertips so they wouldn't beat up in the magazine. Wish I still had the old gun, a FN Supreme action, rifle made in South Gate, SN: 4064. Who could forget that number!

[skeet]

Oh Larry. I shot at the horned owls in the back yard trees lots of times. Drew feathers and nothing else..Finally the one I got(and used for crows) I crippled a wing on. He was surely PI**ED when I went to get him.. He healed up just fine ..only thing of any size on 'em is the head. I was a kid and didn't have a centerfire rifle.. I also have an old Southgate rifle..built obn a square bridge mauser action...also a 300..made in the very early 50's i think...Weatherby made rifles on any actions he could get at that time..or so I have been told. I even saw a Weatherby built on a Win 70 action..way back yonder. Yours had a unique serial number for certain.. Wish I had the foresight to keep the real neat rifles and shotguns I had in the past. Only ones i kept were some collectible Win pre war 70's One is in 7.65 Argentine..Cody museum said they only made about 10 of 'em. Told me if i wanted to sell it it would go for 5 figures easily..they wanted me to donate it. LOL..I also haqve an original Win 70 9mm bbl..never shot.

We have some horned owls here around the house but they are sure a lot smaller than the ones we had back there in Md. They also don't make the same kind of calls