Don't Loose Chickens to Hawks.

Despite, the nice weather we're having here Mom and I haven't been able to let the girls outside for very long. Why, you ask? Hawks. They're not that bad most of the year, but every winter hawks from up North inundate the area. Which wouldn't be a problem if they only hunted mice and small birds and left the chickens alone. Unfortunately, they do not.
We lost our rooster to hawks last year, (That's how we ended up needing Abe) ever since then we do everything we can to avoid losing anymore chickens. Here are four pieces of advice for keeping your chickens safe.

   -Don't let them out when there are hawks about. Listen for their tell-tale screech, watch for large shadows flying over head, or large birds perched in neighboring trees, telephone wires, or fences. Don't let then out that day unless you can stay outside and around the flock while they are out.

  -Put a cover on your run. Putting wire on top of your run can also detour other predators.

  -Fishing line. I've heard that stringing fishing line over your run will detour hawks. They see the line shining in the sun and don't want to mess with it.    

  -If you can't put a cover on your run and the fishing line doesn't work at least make sure you don't build a run that is long and narrow. A hawk can swoop right into a long narrow run and get your chickens.


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The New Chicken House

   We where out of cages, and the Surprise chicks were out of room. We didn't want to put 'Possum, Handful, and Amy's girl in with their parents because the peaking order is so horrible and we have a thing about putting all our hens in one house. Mom and I were trying to figure out what to do when it hit us: put my old play house in between the house and the garage and use the two 10'x6' fence panels to make a run.

                    The panels were going to be part of a second chicken house we planed on building, but didn't, because we might be moving soon and were afraid taking the building apart would weaken it.

    We've taken to calling it Barbie's Dream Chicken House, and have named the girl from Amy's brood Barbie.

   Here is a picture of the nest Handful made for herself complete with egg, which for some reason looks blue in the picture. 'Possum who is the same age as Handful isn't laying yet, but both of the Ameraucana girls took a while to start laying.

  The cats love it. Bird watching, particularly close up chicken watching, is one of their favorite things to do. And the chickens in turn seem to enjoy cat watching. Whenever they see a cat laying on the cinderblock or in the dirt near the pen they run up it and hang out. When they aren't watching cats they are usually ruining Mom's heirloom Amaryllises and Pineapple plants. The little flock is all together for the picture to the right. Possum is in front, Handful's facing her, and Barbie is to the right with her back to the camera.

   A couple of days ago when the cold front blew in Persephone, who's favorite place to hang out is the roof, jumped off the garage roof onto the play house and hung out in there while Mom and I finished setting up the light for the little girls. Before we were done Sephy was out. As you can see in the picture she was looking at the roof from the top of the chicken house so she might have jumped straight up onto the roof. We're not sure.



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             Thank you for reading Bats Bizarre's offical blog. Have a bat-tastic day!