Don't post here much, but is there some way to deter hawks away to keep them from the chickens or do I just have to fire warning shots at them?

Free range open pasture or smaller barnyard area with fence but no too?

Free range

Without using lethal methods, you will just need to keep buying replacement free range chickens. Raptors do not disperse very far when harassed, and will return as soon as the coast is clear.

Ok is there any way to get a permit to shoot these things?

USFWS would be your only call necessary in your area.

While it may happen out there somewhere I do not believe
permits are ever issued to kill hawks or owls or falcons when
free range poultry are involved.

The one phone call to their office will tell you what legally is allowed and isn't.

I have a couple of neighbors who lose half their flock every year to raptors. They complain but will not do what needs to be done to protect their birds.

Birds can still free range with movable shelter but the fact is, if you let your birds run around unprotected, you will lose some or all.

That is very true. But when people come tour my farm and pay $7 a dozen for eggs and can see chickens running around, they like the idea of that better then being in a moveable enclosure.

I use flagging tape. Run a few rows over their run if is not too large. I see raptors flying over my birds run and have never lost a bird to them.

I can certainly understand that. How many birds are you losing?

Are your birds in a secure coop at night?

Each state is different in what and how they allow the protection of livestock and raising fowl. Sometimes the law is misstated or the person telling you just doesn,t know. They may not be telling you to protect the killers that are hurting your animals.

You might want to review your states laws more closely.

You have the right to protect your animals from raptors here. It also tells how it must be done. You ask most anyone and they will tell you differently.

Hey Kirk,

More curious than anything, are you saying Georgia as a state allows for take of raptors (hawks and owls)? If so is this a deal your federal fish and wildlife service made with your state game and fish?

I'm more than confident folks have and do remove all manner of protected federal birds whether woodpecker or hawk/owl illegally, but curious if somehow GA has some exemption for take that is formally agreed upon.

Not something I need to know, just curious again as I've never heard of something that didn't require some serious background before any removal.

We even have folks here who have nesting hawks in their yard on their property and bombing folks and it is rare any removal is ever allowed and if it is, it is always federal or state avian biologists who come and do the removal.

Best,

Justin

(Ga Code 27-3-62)

Trump has said he is going to protect us. I wonder if that includes everyday poultry farmers?

Hey thanks Kirk,

I pulled that up on a law website, this looks like it refers to trapping, firbearers or pests of a non federally protected type no?

http://codes.findlaw.com/ga/title-27-game-and-fish/ga-code-sect-27-3-62.html

Maybe there is another section I'm not seeing?

Thanks for the dialogue.

Justin

It states from "any predatory bird or animal". As long as the trap is made of steel.

They are secured at night and it's not uncommon to lose 5 a day. Some times less sometimes more.

OK. We can count out owls then.

Do you find the carcasses or are they gone? If you're finding them, how close to where the chickens roam? How much of the bird is eaten?

They are gone, just a ring of feathers. Most of the time the chickens head into a strip that as buck thorn and stuff in it to hide but once they come out into the grass they get picked off.