Although this isn’t technically about vegetables I just wanted to know anybody’s thoughts in the area about Hawks.
Early last summer I was happily pottering in my garden when I felt I large gust from above me, followed by a loud squeal.
As I looked up a saw a large hawk flying off with one of my dunnocks that visited the garden regularly. Upon seeing this I later saw two younger hawks near my area.
Yet again, this summer, after hearing the commotion of tweeting birds in my garden, and thinking a nearby cat was roaming, I looked out the window to see an adult hawk, possibly a Goshawk, perched on my fence devouring one of my friendly black birds, or its baby. Obviously, the hawks food chain in their natural habitats must be decreasing, forcing them to prey on animals and birds within inner garden areas.
As much as I think hawks are beautiful creatures, I do not appreciate the hawks preying on our garden wildlife. As much as many of us may think sparrows a nuisance I am a keen lover of any wildlife and do think all animals help the environment in some way. However, I am not quite so keen on the hawk entering this food chain, or my small sized garden, when I’m happily pottering amongst the flowerbed- it was rather scary (but I haven’t been attacked yet!).
Has anyone else experienced such sites? And, is there anything I can do to deter the hawks!?
In general RSPB do not think raptors are a major threat to songbirds, but obviously it is distressing to watch, and we have had a sparrow hawk fly through our garden a couple of times, taking out a sparrow and a starling.
ReplyDeleteI think I remember hearing that the best thing to do is to give the small birds the edge is to feed them in a fairly 'cluttered' environment e.g. Next to a dense tree or shrub, or under a pergola, so they can escape into it, and also you could hang objects (other bird feeders ?) from a pergola, which breaks up the flight path of the raptor, so it has to do more swerving to get its prey, giving the garden bird a few critical moments to escape.
It is noticeable in the picture above that the garden is very open.
RSPB further comments here; http://www.rspb.org.uk/Images/birdsofprey_songbirds_tcm9-188711.pdf
And here:
http://www.rspb.org.uk/community/wildlife/b/wildlife/archive/2012/03/22/could-i-have-seen-a-bird-of-prey-in-the-garden.aspx
Richard