Something got our hen and i'm not sure what happened

[rt0026]

We have 8 buff orpington chickens. All of them hens. They are now 13 months old. We live in Dallas, TX and we keep them in our backyard. They have a nice coop, fully fenced in with predator guard around the coop so nothing can dig under the coop and get in that way.

Since they were a few months old we have been letting them out of the coop to free range in our fenced in back yard. They have never tried to fly/escape the yard. They are very happy. I like them to free range because if I wait till I get home to let them out then it’s only about an hour till it gets dark and they have to be put up.

Someone in our house noticed that there was a chicken that was not moving in the back yard. I came home from work. The chicken was laying in the yard with feathers around her. She was alive. She looked fine. Her head/neck/back was all 100% normal. I flipped her over and all the stuff was gone under her right wing. It looks like something ate the meat of her leg and thigh and then left.

There was not even much blood. The muscle was just gone and therefore she has no use of her leg. She was dying and I had to bury her. I could look at her face that was passing out and could tell there was no saving her. She still could move her wings and head, but there was little life left.


I checked the fence and a dog could not have done it. No holes to get in and out. I am thinking it was a hawk. BUT would the hawk not just try to fly away with the meal??? Why would a hawk just eat a leg and a thigh and leave the rest???


So confused. Any ideas?

 

[Trish1974]

That sounds like a hawk. Most species couldn't carry off a full grown chicken and they eat what they can at the kill site. Sorry you had to go through that.

 

[MaMaher]

Awww....I'm sorry. That's an awful thing to have happen.

 

[path.otto]

Oh! I'm so sorry for you and your poor chicken! It does sound like a hawk. I heard one get a wild rabbit within 50 ft. of us and it could not carry the rabbit off. We scared it off but had to put the rabbit down.

So sad, nature can be a real bitch sometimes!

 

[chickengeorgeto]

One of those beautifully efficient killer hawks ate part of your hen while she was helplessly held down, obviously without bothering first to kill her.

To answer your last question hawks have nothing in common with the lift capacity of a 747 jet plane except for the fact that both hawks & 747's have wings. The largest hawk in North America is the female of the Eastern race of the Redtail Hawk. She can top out at 4 1/2 pounds. Her male counterpart however only weighs in at about 2 1/4 pounds. This is hardly big enough to fly away with a struggling victim the size of a BO. Those hens may top out at 8 pounds or more. West of the Mississippi the she red tail hawk is lucky to weigh 4 pounds and her mate may only tip the scales at 1 3/4 pounds

Forget everything that Walt Disney & company told you about hawks and other predators when you were growing up. The kindest thing that can be said is that everything WD told you was a lie.

It may well be that the culprit was a Cooper's hawk, blue darter hawk a.k.a a sharp shinned hawk. These two raptors are both much smaller than a red tail hawk.

 

[rt0026]

This is the first chicken that has died. They are 13 months old. I’m not sure I handled it right. The chicken was very weak. Chicken was probably going to die in a few hours if not sooner.

I dug a hole. Put the chicken in and covered the hole. The other chickens were watching us. It didn’t feel right to stomp on it’s head. These chickens are human friendly and we raised them as pets.


Should I have stomped on it’s head before burying it?

 

[Kathy Golla]

Its OK. Dont second guess yourself or feel guilty. No one ever knows how one will handle something like this until its right upon us.

 

[chickengeorgeto]

You did the right thing but personally I would have wrung the poor hen's neck, in my view wringing a chickens' neck is a less violent method of culling a hen, but that is just my feelings on the matter.

 

[happyfrenchman]

Hawk will eat your bird while it is still alive. Merciless. Just another reason I never hesitate to pop one when I get the opportunity. I would have decapitated it with the shovel before I buried it. Just saying... But I probably would have decapitated it to put it out of it's misery, and then left it out as bait for an ambush with the rifle. I do not play around with those things.

 

[KDMdesigns]

@rt0026 What parts of Dallas are you located at? We live in East Dallas by the lake and have had our share of Hawk close calls here.. I try not to let my girls free range without supervision anymore. Would love to connect...