Posted: 2/12/2011 3:03:18 PM EDT
My wife came home to this today. A hawk is suspected since we saw one a couple of months ago but were able to chase it off. Any advice? (not the kind of advice that would result in ClubFed time, please).  This is either a hawk or the leftovers from a voodoo ceremony involving chicken guts.   Yes, those are chicken legs. We were looking forward to the drumsticks those used to be attached to.   Chicken wing? ETA: do pics work now? Hmm. I reloaded the pics. 1 pic (the one that works) was by itself. The other three, I used the new bulk loader. I'll go back and re-hose without the bulk loader and see if that makes a difference. ETA 3: Fixed! The images loaded with the new bulk loader were set to private only. After uploading, I had to go to each one to make public. |
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Every time I had a hawk kill one of my chickens the remains were never spread over as wide of an area as your appear to be. I might have feathers spread over a 10 foot area but the bloody carcass was usually in one location and it appeared to be eaten in place.
Now I have had foxes drag the little guys around leaving a blood streak across the grass. Its hard to tell from your pictures how many fresh animal foot prints are around but the last one does look like some critter was about. Good luck |
| We've lived here since July and have had one attempt on a chicken (by a hawk, we chased it off). I don't know what the tracks are from here because I'm at work (see avatar). We do have a dog, and I don't think she's seen other tracks around. The dog is accounted for, though. Inside the house when it happened. |
The tracks in the snow consist of chicken, turkey, dog (ours), and some sort of bird tracks.... If the tracks are still there I'll take a picture. The current chicken pen is buried in 10' of snow as the garage roof dumped it there  The chickens were just loose at the time but tend to hang out in the coop with the door open during the day. That's where one got grabbed. Whatever ate it dragged it a few feet away and ate part of it than went to a slightly higher vantage point and finished his meal.
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I have written permission form my local conservation officer to shoot hawks, raccoons, foxes, and opossums. I just called and asked. He came out took a look around at my place to see if he could find any recommendations as to what I could do to stop them. Being as I live in the middle of the woods there is nothing that I could do that I am not already doing, so he gave me the green light.
I have found many tore up chickens. I actually caught a hawk eating one and ran it off. It was so brazen that by the time I walked away to go get a trash bag to put the dead bird in it was there again eating and would not fly away until I got within 10 feet of it. I went back inside to get a shotgun and it was on the chicken again, it was SO well camouflaged I didn't even see it until I was on top of it, so I missed it. I went back inside, came back out 10 minutes later and it was there AGAIN, this time as soon as it saw me it flew away. I didn't see it again after that (at least not that day). |