- Joined
- May 12, 2006
- Messages
- 658
I've got a coop of pigeons that it seems ever since the day I got them I've been plagued by these small hawks that I'd never before seen in my entire life. Before I even knew it was a hawk, I'd find partially eaten pigeon bodies pulled through the wire down by the floor. Within a week 3 were dead and partially feasted upon...
I called the DNR and they kept insisting that it was a raccoon, it was "the classic sign of a raccoon!". Yeah right. Why is it when I set a live-trap with the leftovers and I catch a hawk? I don't think hawks are opportunistic carrion feeders, unless it was their kill anyway.
Once I caught my first one, back in November iirc, I called the DNR to see if they could send a Conservation Officer out to collect it and relocate it since it was making itself a nuisance. All they told me was to fix my pen; a fully wired, roofed pen on a concrete pad and just let it make itself a nuisance. They wouldn't call a wildlife relocator because they didn't feel they had to, since after all a raccoon was doing the major damage.
Well come to find out its illegal to trap them, keep them, or release them. Talk about a pickle. Eventually I found a sane Conservation Officer who was the head of a local fish and wildlife area and he said just go ahead and transport it to his forest and release it and if anyone has any problems to call him. He did admit my route was better than what most people around here do, shoot them.
Over the past month or two I've been having this hawk show up at my coop around 7-8am every morning, flying around the cage terrorizing the pigeons within. Granted I did add some scrap pieces of wire to the portion of the cage where the roosts were and I haven't had any to be picked off while inside the pen...but its still making itself a nuisance by scaring the living bejesus out of my pigeons on a daily basis.
So I set a live trap again with the remains of a pigeon that died of natural causes, I broke open the carcass to show off the nice bloody interior and lookit what I found today...I was wondering why all of the pigeons were sitting on the other side of the pen all day (the live-trap's view is blocked by a rather large tree)...
This time I transported the hawk farther out into the country, to an old homestead site adjacent to a large strip coal mine that seems to have abundant numbers of pigeons, doves, and rabbits. Hopefully it stays there...
I called the DNR and they kept insisting that it was a raccoon, it was "the classic sign of a raccoon!". Yeah right. Why is it when I set a live-trap with the leftovers and I catch a hawk? I don't think hawks are opportunistic carrion feeders, unless it was their kill anyway.
Once I caught my first one, back in November iirc, I called the DNR to see if they could send a Conservation Officer out to collect it and relocate it since it was making itself a nuisance. All they told me was to fix my pen; a fully wired, roofed pen on a concrete pad and just let it make itself a nuisance. They wouldn't call a wildlife relocator because they didn't feel they had to, since after all a raccoon was doing the major damage.
Well come to find out its illegal to trap them, keep them, or release them. Talk about a pickle. Eventually I found a sane Conservation Officer who was the head of a local fish and wildlife area and he said just go ahead and transport it to his forest and release it and if anyone has any problems to call him. He did admit my route was better than what most people around here do, shoot them.
Over the past month or two I've been having this hawk show up at my coop around 7-8am every morning, flying around the cage terrorizing the pigeons within. Granted I did add some scrap pieces of wire to the portion of the cage where the roosts were and I haven't had any to be picked off while inside the pen...but its still making itself a nuisance by scaring the living bejesus out of my pigeons on a daily basis.
So I set a live trap again with the remains of a pigeon that died of natural causes, I broke open the carcass to show off the nice bloody interior and lookit what I found today...I was wondering why all of the pigeons were sitting on the other side of the pen all day (the live-trap's view is blocked by a rather large tree)...
This time I transported the hawk farther out into the country, to an old homestead site adjacent to a large strip coal mine that seems to have abundant numbers of pigeons, doves, and rabbits. Hopefully it stays there...
