Do you have birdfeeders out to keep your bird friends happy?

Do you have a hawk coming around your backyard and chasing away and/or killing your birds?

Then you have either a Cooper’s Hawk or Sharp-shinned Hawk and
you have created the perfect backyard diner for these accipiters.  These species hunt primarily smaller birds from sparrows to doves. 

Accipiters are designed for hunting in tight quarters like bushes and trees.  Their short wings and long tail give them the agility to chase through branches and leaves without fear. 

For more information and to see pictures so you can identify them, check out Cooper’s Hawk and Sharp-shinned Hawk.

Unfortunately there is little you can do to chase them off.  The only method that works (and only sometimes), is to remove your feeders for a while.  Once the food source for the hawks is gone, they will move on.  But this is no guarantee.
Putting the feeders closer to the house may help as well.   But I have watched a Cooper’s Hawk take advantage of this as well.   She would fly past the sparrows at the feeder, scaring them so they would fly into the window hard enough to fall to the ground in a daze.  Then she would fly back around and pick off any birds unfortunate enough to have hit the window.   The other option is to learn to enjoy these amazing raptors for their part in the food web.   Watch how they adapt to their surroundings.

Cooper’s Hawks are one of the few raptors in our area with an increase in population, thanks to the many feeders that make it easier for them to hunt and survive.