[birding] Sharpy takes chicken!

[Mark Nikas]

We had a young Cooper's Hawk take one of my son's banties earlier this 
fall.
A few years ago this would have caused him much anguish but losing 
free
range chickens to predators has become rather common place. He 
switched
to just banties because they can fly and are more nimble than their 
full sized
cousins and hopefully could elude predators better. The whole family 
watched
this Cooper's for some time out our back picture window. It kept 
trying to fly
off with the chicken but it couldn't get more than a foot or so off 
the ground
so it just settled down and had lunch there in the yard. It would 
"mantle" over
the banty by spreading its wings over it like an umbrella whenever the 
local
Redtail flew over. It was a little gruesome and a little sad but 
overall a fascinating
bit of avian drama to watch.

Mark Nikas


--------------------------------------------------
From: <bouchdon at peak.org>
Sent: Monday, January 05, 2009 12:32 PM
To: <mid-valley-nature at googlegroups.com>
Cc: <list at midvalleybirding.org>
Subject: [birding] Sharpy takes chicken!

> Hello Birders,
>
> My coworker, Scobel Wiggins, has had a Sharp-shinned Hawk attack her
> Bantam Chickens recently. The other day, the little rooster was 
> killed. He
> was probably bravely defending his hens, may he rest in peace :-(
>
> The description of the bird fits that of Sharp-shinned Hawk. 
> Ambitious! My
> guess is that it was a female hawk.
>
> Don Boucher
> www.neighborhood-naturalist.com
>
> _______________________________________________
> list mailing list
> list at midvalleybirding.org
> http://midvalleybirding.org/mailman/listinfo/list
> http://oregonbirdwatch.org/pipermail/obol/ 
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