buzzards

[jayjay 264]

this is a question to all the experienced falconers on here, do you think that a wild buzzard would go in to a chicken run in an allotment and kill the chickens? only a work mate went over to lock his chickens up the other night only to find about 5 or 6 chickens dead and the cockerel was wounded hiding out of the way, the birds that had been killed and left had been stripped of a few feathers and the flesh had been eaten,i said perhaps a fox,mink,or a cat had gone in there and probably been disturbed, because i have never heard of buzzards taking chickens in a run,but he said his boy seen a buzzard hovering about in the area which does'nt really prove anything,but his boy is 100% certain it was the buzzard that done this,any information would be appreciated,

thanks,

all the best,

 

jay.

[romany52 313]

Don't think a Buzzard would kill more than one bird, they kill , feed and f... off. sounds more like a Fox to me.

[poacher3161 1,766]

I will say 100pct thats not a bird of prey thats done that its not in their make up to kill just for the sake of it unlike foxes or members of the mustelid family.atb dell

[jayjay 264]

thanks for replys, i said the same,i thought birds of prey kill for the need of a meal, not for the sake of it,cheers,

 

jay.

[jasper65 6]

Jayjay

 

I'm not sure about some other BOP but I'm certain and witnessed it myself a friends young Goshawk drop into a Pheasant pen by accident nailing a poult! only to leave that poult and nail another one running at the fence and go off on another frenzy to nail another, This bird was a young bird of the year still going through its adolecent stage wanting nail anything that moves. most trainned accipters are the same when fit and in hunting condition!! its also not unusual for a trainned Gos to take a crop and still bate off at other quarry before its put its crop over......

 

On the Buzzard subject I'm having a problem here with one of my Leg Horns being killed through the back Hedge. the Buzzards have a nest about two woods away from the garden and regular patrol and ring over the garden and surrounding fields, the day my Leg Horn went missing they was over the Garden a couple of times! the day after I went looking for the chicken only to find two plucking areas where the bird met its maker, in the past I have always though a Fox would chomp through the shafts of the feathers leaving this tell tale sign but at you can see in the pictures all these feathers are intact and plucked in the manner of a BOP? I'll be gobsmacked if its one of the Buzzards but it certainly doesn't look like a fox to me...

 

the picture shows one bunch of feathers followed by another a good 30ft away and also the other side of the Hedge in the Garden where the chicken ran through for the last time....

 

Jasper

[josh-waddingham 13]

very unlikely not to be a buzzard especially how it has kill 5 or 6, im 99% sure it is a charlie fox, the fox aims to only eat one at a time but kills every chicken that has seen him to stop the noise!

not saying you are blaming the buzzard but the buzzard gets blaimed for many cases like this by gamekeepers nowadays just if they knew how laid back buzzards were they would much rather take a rabbit lieing at the side of the road been flattened by a lorry, tha a pheasant walking around at the end of there nose.

atb