About caution and predator awareness: As mentioned above, 'flighty' is part of what helps! And birds who have survived a bad experience tend to learn caution, at the expense of loosing flockmates.
Chickens tend to have two behaviors when threatened, and individuals tend to repeat the same thing when frightened. Flying up in panic works well if it's a ground predator, while crouching under cover is good against raptors. Flying up will help that hawk, and crouching on the ground is great for four legged critters.
We've had experience with both behaviors and both predator types, and chicken is on everyone's menu...
Mary
Chickens tend to have two behaviors when threatened, and individuals tend to repeat the same thing when frightened. Flying up in panic works well if it's a ground predator, while crouching under cover is good against raptors. Flying up will help that hawk, and crouching on the ground is great for four legged critters.
We've had experience with both behaviors and both predator types, and chicken is on everyone's menu...
Mary