Raptor Fail - Puppy dropped by hawk, rescued.

[Perd Hapley]

He dropped the puppy right in someone's back yard, and the pesky humans stole his lunch.

http://www.ksee24.com/news/local/Hawk-Puppy---AAS-151632965.html


That will teach him to pick on cute, innocent little puppies. That's right, Hawk-boy. Not only does everyone know you are a big bully, but all your friends will know you can't even hunt. Have a nice life!

[Ben]

This happened about an hour from my folks' place. I've noticed in the last about two years, that the red-tailed hawk population has exploded. You see them all over the place in CA now. This year I started seeing nests on power poles along the entire drive to my folks' place, which I'd rarely seen before, and there's about a half a dozen hawks living at the park across the street from us.

Glad the little tyke wiggled his way out of the claws of death.

[Tallpine]

A couple years ago, I found my favorite kitty just staring into space and he had talon wounds on his shoulders.

One eye was dilated and the other not, so he must have had a brain injury - from being dropped

He got a huge abcess which drained from a several inch long skin break in his chest.

He recovered completely, but comes in at night now.

[roo_ster]

This happened about an hour from my folks' place. I've noticed in the last about two years, that the red-tailed hawk population has exploded. You see them all over the place in CA now. This year I started seeing nests on power poles along the entire drive to my folks' place, which I'd rarely seen before, and there's about a half a dozen hawks living at the park across the street from us.

Glad the little tyke wiggled his way out of the claws of death.

Same here.  LOTS more sitting atop power poles & such.  Even had one atop a light pole at work.

[mtnbkr]

I don't know the species, but we have a rather large raptor population in NoVA as well.  We also have a good Bald Eagle population. 

Chris

[makattak]

I don't know the species, but we have a rather large raptor population in NoVA as well.  We also have a good Bald Eagle population. 

Chris

Dang it and I was about to snark that the hawks are exploding in California because the windmills are killing all the bald eagles.

[Perd Hapley]

I don't know the species, but we have a rather large raptor population in NoVA as well.  We also have a good Bald Eagle population. 

Chris

That close to D.C.? Probably not raptors. Vultures, more like.

[Jamisjockey]

I don't know the species, but we have a rather large raptor population in NoVA as well.  We also have a good Bald Eagle population. 

Chris

Lots of osprey around NoVA down through the bay too.  Always saw a *expletive deleted*it ton of them fishing.

That close to D.C.? Probably not raptors. Vultures, more like.

Fistful for the win!

[Tallpine]

Redtails are very common around here.

We saw a great horned owl yesterday.

[vaskidmark]

That close to D.C.? Probably not raptors. Vultures, more like.

I'm in thecity with the largest collection of second place trophies.  We have perigrine falcons downtown doing what they can to control the flying rat problem.  We have bald eales and osprey along the river - you can see their nests from some of the government buildings facing the river.  Several of the parks have resident hawk populations - last month I spent the better part of half an hour watching 2 male red-tails working out a boundary dispute.  There are barn owls where there have never been barns.  Other types of owls too, but I'm not up on what type they are.

Several parts of DC have as good, if not better habitat to support raptors.  I'd be truely amazed to find out there were none there.

And of course there are the buzzards.  They mainly congregate along the edges of The Mall eastwards from  about 16th Street NW to about 1st Street SE.  Apparently that is excellent habitat.

stay safe.

[BryanP]

I usually root for the hawks, but not with puppies and kitties.  Yeah, I'm a softie.

We have a healthy population of red tailed hawks and cooper's hawks around here.  My wife has several bird feeders set up with plenty of black oil sunflower seed. We keep a large population of cardinals, doves, finches and other birds fat and happy. I call it "The hawk buffet."

[Perd Hapley]

We saw a great horned owl yesterday.

HOW GREAT WAS IT!

[Tallpine]

HOW GREAT WAS IT!

It was a Hoot! 

[TommyGunn]

    Punny....very punny. 

[230RN]

Somewhere in the dark recesses of my memory, I seem to recall that prey-dropping was a relatively risk-free method of killing the raptor's larger prey, on which the bird could then dine without any struggles.  I know that many birds drop hard-shelled creatures like mussels and clams on rocks to break them open, but I can't seem to find anything on raptors dropping soft prey.  However, my search engine skills are not top-notch.

[Perd Hapley]

Somewhere in the dark recesses of my memory, I seem to recall that prey-dropping was a relatively risk-free method of killing their larger prey, on which the bird could then dine without any struggles. 

I thought of that, too. He definitely didn't drop it far enough.

[Stand_watie]

I live in Kaufman county, Texas which bills itself the red tailed hawk capital. I love raptors and drive my wife absolutely crazy because I slow down and gawk at every damn last one of them. My neighbors swear that not only hawks, but hoot owls are responsible for munching on various cats and small dogs.

 I work near downtown Dallas, right on the Trinity river, at a plant that has a lot of tall, perchlike places, and so see hawks at work too.  They also perch on light poles along L.B.J. in North Dallas (looking for rats in the median I suppose). You Dallasites who like raptors might like to look for that, but don't slow down while you're doing it, or you'll get rear ended.

A few weeks ago a hawk came and perched not a hundred feet from me while I was driving a loud piece of machinery. Lesson learned? Dallas Trinity river bottom hawks are not afraid of bobcats

[gunsmith]

I was walking Sparky one night ( fox terrier/Chi mix ) usually a brave little dog - in San Francisco - he got scared and was looking nervously at a tree, I shined my surefire and it was a huge Great Horned looking down at us.  Made me nervous he was so big.

I see huge (owls I think) birds flying at night here sometimes when driving, we also have hawks and Golden Eagles around but they seem to ignore the domestic animals

Had a huge Eagle scare the heck out of me while doing 70 near a cliff on highway 80, he zoomed past the front of the truck I was driving - I think only 6 or 7 ft away, it would have gone right thru the glass at our combined speeds.

[Stand_watie]

A biology professor I had in college claimed that the only documented predatory death of a grown person by a native bird in north america  was a great horned owl. A trapper in a coonskin hat.

You guessed it, owl mistook his head for a racoon. Apparently he lived long enough to tell the story, but I guess owl talons through your skull are unhealthy.

[Tallpine]

A biology professor I had in college claimed that the only documented predatory death of a grown person by a native bird in north america  was a great horned owl. A trapper in a coonskin hat.

You guessed it, owl mistook his head for a racoon. Apparently he lived long enough to tell the story, but I guess owl talons through your skull are unhealthy.

Infection :(

Talons are infamous for septic stuff.

[Stand_watie]

Infection :(

Talons are infamous for septic stuff.

Infection if not from brain bleeding first. What caliber are great horned owl's talons? .1? .15?

I had an almost psychedelic experience with an owl as a child. It was a large white owl in the winter in Maine, with snow on the ground, at night, with snow falling. It flew within about 15 or 20 feet of me and perched in a tree less than a hundred feet away, all without making a sound percievable to 11 or 12 year old (in other words very good) hearing. I thought my eyes were seeing a shadow because my ears were telling me a bird that big couldn't possibly be there. I have no trouble seeing where native american legend associating owls with spirits comes from. They are freakishly silent fliers.

[gunsmith]

A biology professor I had in college claimed that the only documented predatory death of a grown person by a native bird in north america  was a great horned owl. A trapper in a coonskin hat.

You guessed it, owl mistook his head for a racoon. Apparently he lived long enough to tell the story, but I guess owl talons through your skull are unhealthy.

No wonder I was nervous.

[Stand_watie]

...
I see huge (owls I think) birds flying at night here sometimes when driving, we also have hawks and Golden Eagles around but they seem to ignore the domestic animals...

I saw a bird fly out of the road a few weeks ago as I was driving to work about 4 a.m. - could see almost nothing except that it was songbird sized and had eyes that reflected red. I think I've mentioned before that I live next door to the Texas variant of Ted Nugent. That comes in handy when I have wildlife questions..."Whippoorwill" he said.

[erictank]

That close to D.C.? Probably not raptors. Vultures, more like.

I see plenty of vultures, but also bald eagles, some sort of hawks, and we have ospreys overfly the water plant on a fairly-regular basis. Last week, one did so carrying a fish half its own body length. I was fairly impressed.

ETA: totally missed that joke. Don't know how, but I definitely missed it.