Hi, I’m curious on your thoughts about what Hawk species is most likely to harm livestock such as chickens. I want to gain my knowledge of that so if anyone asks me I could answer them correctly.
Thanks so much!
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Goshawks have attempted to raid our chicken coups on a few occasions and even succeeded once. I wouldn’t know which hawk species is most likely to harm chickens though. The American goshawk is the only hawk I’ve seen around here.
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Red-tailed and Cooper’s hawks. They caught a few of our chickens.
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I would think whatever is around… I know red-tailed hawks like to pick up some of my family’s chickens. Bald eagles (and coyotes) actually seem to like to try to get them the most but for specifically hawks, I think red-tailed is all they’ve seen. But they definitely do try to get at the chickens and have successfully plucked (pun) a few off.
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Most likely I would say Red-Tailed, Red-Shouldered, and Cooper’s Hawks would be the most common ones to look out for. Hawks usually find prey during the day, so during the night the chickens would be a bit safer from hawks, but not from other predators like owls or coyotes (I’d also look out for black bears, this is a pretty common interaction between bears and humans). I’d look out for any large bird circling the area, as it’s usually a sign that a bird of prey is hunting. I’d recommend keeping a well-covered coop to keep them out of sight and planting some small bushes for cover, too.
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Very interesting!
That’s what has mostly gotten ours in the past. Thanks for the info.
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Thanks for sharing!
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Ok thanks for all the info! I agree with you about the hawks the most common hawk in my area is the Red-Shouldered Hawk.
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It is very neat to see different peoples opinion. Thanks everyone! I think it is awesome we can I discuss things like this.
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@wvbirder Please consider responding to multiple people in one post using Discourse’s quote function. This helps keep threads cleaner and can prevent getting locked out of posting. Thanks!
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@cthawley, First I have to thank you! Because I felt like I was taking up a big space in the thread and I didn’t know what to do about it. Again thanks so much! Do you want me to delete and edit the post?
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No need to edit anything already posted!
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Ok thanks! I really appreciate it!
I think probably any hawk large enough will eat a chicken, sharp shinned hawks are probably less of a threat due to small size, but otherwise I think they all will go after chickens
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@insectobserver123, I agree!
For us it’s brown goshawks. They also stalk the native hens when they have chicks.
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Same here, they are the primary 2 species I see in the PNW, and we’ve had a few instances of them coming around in the past decade or so. Raccoons have been a much bigger problem though.
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Black bears have tried to get into our chicken coup on several occasions. We don’t have chickens currently but when we did we would have bear trouble once or twice a year.
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I’ve seen mostly Red-tailed Hawks do this, but occasionally a Cooper’s. I did once watch a Cooper’s in our backyard standing on the ground next to the chickens who were hiding underneath a forsythia shrub. It didn’t so anything to them, but once it saw me watching it flew away. I personally have lost no chickens to any hawks, but I know many people who have.
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