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Lost three hens to a hawk in one Tuesday afternoon
Came home from work and found feathers scattered across the whole run (about 30 feet of chaos) and three of my best layers gone, just like that. Has anyone else had luck with those hawk decoys or netting over the top, or should I just accept that open runs are a risk?
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finley_lopez981mo ago
My buddy Mike out in Colorado lost six birds in one week to a Cooper's hawk. He put up that reflective tape stuff and some old CDs on strings all over the run. Worked for about two weeks then the hawk got wise to it. He finally just covered the whole top with heavy-duty bird netting and hasn't lost one since. Netting is the only thing that actually stopped it for him.
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matthewp521mo ago
Yeah but once you put the netting up, how do you actually keep it taut enough so birds don't get tangled in it? I've seen setups where the net sags and a hen gets her leg caught trying to hop up on a roost bar. That's a whole different kind of mess to deal with. And what about snow load in the winter if you're up in Colorado? That heavy wet stuff will collapse a net right onto the birds if you don't slope it right. I'm wondering if your buddy had to rig up a frame under his net or if he just draped it over the top.
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