Why don't we shoot hawks anymore?
- Thread starter tod osier
- Start date
Mike Sheppard
Active member
To my grandfather all raptors were "chicken hawks" and were dealt with accordingly.
At least locally this all changed in the late sixties.
Few people depended an locally raised birds for food any longer.
that seems to be the time when our culture decided to value all wildlife equally, to the detriment of our small game birds.
there have not been enough quail to sustain hunting here for 30 years.
and you have to go a long way from any timber to find a pheasant.
At least locally this all changed in the late sixties.
Few people depended an locally raised birds for food any longer.
that seems to be the time when our culture decided to value all wildlife equally, to the detriment of our small game birds.
there have not been enough quail to sustain hunting here for 30 years.
and you have to go a long way from any timber to find a pheasant.
Steve Sutton
Well-known member
Mike and you think the change in the way Raptors are viewed is the reason for the decline in Quail and Pheasants?....
Steve
Steve
Mike Sheppard
Active member
I can only tell what I have observed in Southeast iowa over 45 years.
As the populations of raptors coyotes and racoon have increased the population of quail plumeted. I helped with the Izarac Walton clubs stocking of
Quail but all the birds were gone in a year.
I know racoon do their share but the quail were gone before the fur prices crashed.
the last field of corn I harvested had a lot of rabbits but by the time I finished picking there were a half dozen hawks circling and hammering the rabbits as they left cover. Sometimes within feet of the combine.
I have never had this happen before in 4 decades of farming,
I'm not saying one species has more value than another, just that society has changed values and yes I'm convinced that has changed the landscape.
As the populations of raptors coyotes and racoon have increased the population of quail plumeted. I helped with the Izarac Walton clubs stocking of
Quail but all the birds were gone in a year.
I know racoon do their share but the quail were gone before the fur prices crashed.
the last field of corn I harvested had a lot of rabbits but by the time I finished picking there were a half dozen hawks circling and hammering the rabbits as they left cover. Sometimes within feet of the combine.
I have never had this happen before in 4 decades of farming,
I'm not saying one species has more value than another, just that society has changed values and yes I'm convinced that has changed the landscape.
Steve Sutton
Well-known member
Released birds do more harm than good...at best they are bait...at worst they pollute the wild gene pool....
I hear where you're coming from but you identified the problem in Iowa in your comments about "back then people relied on themselves to produce their own food"...back then the farms in Iowa, and the rest of the BEST Quail areas were family farms...inefficient by todays farming standards....the reason people quit relying on themselves for their own food was because that was the time that the huge, efficient, corporate farms began to take over the little family farms.....
Iowa has the biggest loss of native habitat in the country....and the highest cost per acre of farm land....you don't pay what land costs there and leave any of it unplanted.....you don't have quail without edge cover and brushy corners and fence rows and shelter belts.....and those are in very short supply in Iowa......it's not a coincidence that back when interestingly back when people depended on their own chickens for eggs and Sunday dinner those little "dirty farms" had all those things that the Quail needed to thrive....
You certainly are correct that Raccoons and Possums and Coyotes, those URBAN predators that can seemingly live anywhere take a toll on what's left...but they aren't the reason there aren't Quail anymore...the reason for that is you just don't have the habitat they need to thrive......same with Hawks.....none of them are Quail specialist and they appear super abundant in heavily farmed areas because of the abundance of waste grain...Quail survived for thousands of years in the presence of predators....the predators didn't cause their crash...the loss of places for them to breed, feed, find cover from inclement weather and predators did....
Bring back the fencelines and shelter belts and field corners and woodlots and you'd see Quail rebound....proof of that exists in places where Quail were all but non-existent but miraculously returned when the habitat did....
Steve
I hear where you're coming from but you identified the problem in Iowa in your comments about "back then people relied on themselves to produce their own food"...back then the farms in Iowa, and the rest of the BEST Quail areas were family farms...inefficient by todays farming standards....the reason people quit relying on themselves for their own food was because that was the time that the huge, efficient, corporate farms began to take over the little family farms.....
Iowa has the biggest loss of native habitat in the country....and the highest cost per acre of farm land....you don't pay what land costs there and leave any of it unplanted.....you don't have quail without edge cover and brushy corners and fence rows and shelter belts.....and those are in very short supply in Iowa......it's not a coincidence that back when interestingly back when people depended on their own chickens for eggs and Sunday dinner those little "dirty farms" had all those things that the Quail needed to thrive....
You certainly are correct that Raccoons and Possums and Coyotes, those URBAN predators that can seemingly live anywhere take a toll on what's left...but they aren't the reason there aren't Quail anymore...the reason for that is you just don't have the habitat they need to thrive......same with Hawks.....none of them are Quail specialist and they appear super abundant in heavily farmed areas because of the abundance of waste grain...Quail survived for thousands of years in the presence of predators....the predators didn't cause their crash...the loss of places for them to breed, feed, find cover from inclement weather and predators did....
Bring back the fencelines and shelter belts and field corners and woodlots and you'd see Quail rebound....proof of that exists in places where Quail were all but non-existent but miraculously returned when the habitat did....
Steve
Vince Pagliaroli
Well-known member
What about CATS? Feral and the neighbors Puddy Cat that they let go outside for a hour or two. There seems to be a lot more of them now a days everywhere I hunt than there ever was. No matter where you go they are always working the edges, and ditches. They know where prey and game are. Watched one jump and kill a pheasant in a ditch a few weeks ago. Hawks and Owls are part of the balance, pets are a different matter I would think.
Vince Pagliaroli
Well-known member
Hey that's a Good One.
Mike Sheppard
Active member
All of that may be true looking at the big picture but most of the area I hunt has far more habitat than it did in the 19 70's
the best quail hunting of my lifetime took place during the "farm fence row to fence row" 19 70's expansion.
the place I used to farm 220 acres of corn now grows maybe 40 acres.
All this habitat hasn't helped the gamebirds and that I blame on predators.
Now deer, that's another story.
the best quail hunting of my lifetime took place during the "farm fence row to fence row" 19 70's expansion.
the place I used to farm 220 acres of corn now grows maybe 40 acres.
All this habitat hasn't helped the gamebirds and that I blame on predators.
Now deer, that's another story.
Steve Sutton
Well-known member
If you believe what the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute says Feral Cats kill as many as one billion birds a year......some of those will be Pheasants and Quail and Grouse and baby Ducks....and the other birds they take might well have been prey that would have been available to predators had they not been taken and provided a buffer for those lost "game birds"....
We once had a Covey of Valley Quail at the house.....lasted through the first five years we lived her and we had nesting Coopers Hawks, Redtails, and Pygmy Owls in the Summer and all of those plus Barred Owls and Sharpshin's in the winter months.....I'm sure some of the Quail were taken by them but never so many that covey dwindled too far to survive.....
Comes a Spring with a new neighbor and cats..house cats..the kind that wear collars that you you can't bring yourself to rid yourself of.....took exactly that first year for that Covey to disappear completely.....wasn't the hawks that did it.....
Steve
We once had a Covey of Valley Quail at the house.....lasted through the first five years we lived her and we had nesting Coopers Hawks, Redtails, and Pygmy Owls in the Summer and all of those plus Barred Owls and Sharpshin's in the winter months.....I'm sure some of the Quail were taken by them but never so many that covey dwindled too far to survive.....
Comes a Spring with a new neighbor and cats..house cats..the kind that wear collars that you you can't bring yourself to rid yourself of.....took exactly that first year for that Covey to disappear completely.....wasn't the hawks that did it.....
Steve
That's what the coyotes are for. Cat eats bird, coyote eats cat, I shoot coyote. More birds, simple. ;-)
I have gotten complaints about raptors taking cats and small dogs. I know that coyotes love them white kitty cats with collars that smell of rose shampoo.
Steve Sutton
Well-known member
once there are no Quail where do the replacement Quail come from?....they aren't migrators....if there isn't interconnected habitat they can't pioneer to fill in empty habitat.....
Best hunting came during the expansion of corporate farms...yep...and guess when the heyday of Prairie Chicken hunting was....not in the period of time before the prairie was broken...but after...during the expansion of farming....sadly for the Chickens the boom busted when the plow broke too much of the prairie....when entire areas lost their populations....when the remaining habitat was so fragmented that the few that remained couldn't expand back to the areas that had habitat...
One last thing and then I'll leave you to your "it's the hawks fault" belief......Quail are VERY tough to manage for....ask Jeff Churan who manages a couple of farms in Missouri for Quail.....its not as simple as letting land remain fallow....that type of habitat will support some birds...but to produce Quail in the numbers we used to have there has to be a very specific mix of habitats....something that only rarely occurs without serious effort, money and longterm commitment to that particular species....you know Iowa better than I do but I'm pretty sure Iowa doesn't "manage" for Bobwhites except for possibly a very few very small acerages.....
Do Hawks and Owls eat game birds...undoubtedly....are they the reason Iowa's Quail hunting is a thing of the past?.....I'll side with the Quail pro's and say NO.....
Steve
Best hunting came during the expansion of corporate farms...yep...and guess when the heyday of Prairie Chicken hunting was....not in the period of time before the prairie was broken...but after...during the expansion of farming....sadly for the Chickens the boom busted when the plow broke too much of the prairie....when entire areas lost their populations....when the remaining habitat was so fragmented that the few that remained couldn't expand back to the areas that had habitat...
One last thing and then I'll leave you to your "it's the hawks fault" belief......Quail are VERY tough to manage for....ask Jeff Churan who manages a couple of farms in Missouri for Quail.....its not as simple as letting land remain fallow....that type of habitat will support some birds...but to produce Quail in the numbers we used to have there has to be a very specific mix of habitats....something that only rarely occurs without serious effort, money and longterm commitment to that particular species....you know Iowa better than I do but I'm pretty sure Iowa doesn't "manage" for Bobwhites except for possibly a very few very small acerages.....
Do Hawks and Owls eat game birds...undoubtedly....are they the reason Iowa's Quail hunting is a thing of the past?.....I'll side with the Quail pro's and say NO.....
Steve
Steve Sutton
Well-known member
Great Horned Owls love them a nice fat skunk.....put a kitty kat outside at night and if you have GHO's you just might find piece of that kitty cat in the owl pellets under the roost tree....a feral black cat with white on it I would bet would have a very low life expectancy if there were GHO's around.....
Steve
Steve
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Mike Sheppard
Active member
Steve
i was just responding to tod's original post on hawk shooting attitudes.
I don't believe hawks are the total or even main problem but I believe overpopulation of all predators are a huge component of the problem.
I'll leave you to your belief in evil corporate farmer but most corporate farmers in iowa ARE family farmers responding to a constant stream of government regulations.
i was just responding to tod's original post on hawk shooting attitudes.
I don't believe hawks are the total or even main problem but I believe overpopulation of all predators are a huge component of the problem.
I'll leave you to your belief in evil corporate farmer but most corporate farmers in iowa ARE family farmers responding to a constant stream of government regulations.
We've got a pile of nesting bald eagles. Some years ago one swooped down and took a small dachsund. The dog bit the eagle till it got dropped, fell to the ground, and survived.
http://igorilla.com/gorilla/animal/2002/eagle_attacks_dog.html
http://igorilla.com/gorilla/animal/2002/eagle_attacks_dog.html
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TimJ
Well-known member
Oddly enough I haven't lost a pigeon to a hawk yet. Knock on wood but losing a few would save on feed. But I did lose one to a cat a couple weeks ago.
I don't believe cats are that big of a deal in truly wild areas. I seldom see them far from a farm. I know a couple trappers and cats being caught are a rare occurrence. My guess is most of the birds killed by puddy tats are urban birds...not that it is any better.
On a side note the cat that killed the pigeon was lucky it ran the right direction when it was last seen in my yard. There is a young german who is discovering his love for cats. I only curtailed his lust when it appeared they were going to have their rendezvous in the crazy cat lady's yard. Might not be the best place for that to happen.
Tim
I don't believe cats are that big of a deal in truly wild areas. I seldom see them far from a farm. I know a couple trappers and cats being caught are a rare occurrence. My guess is most of the birds killed by puddy tats are urban birds...not that it is any better.
On a side note the cat that killed the pigeon was lucky it ran the right direction when it was last seen in my yard. There is a young german who is discovering his love for cats. I only curtailed his lust when it appeared they were going to have their rendezvous in the crazy cat lady's yard. Might not be the best place for that to happen.
Tim
I'll relate some experience ...although old..pre act. When I was a youngster at home I raised pigeons. Had about 75 to 100 and they were allowed out during the day. I had a GHO that figured out that they sat on the loft roof right at dusk before slipping inside for the night and I'd close them up. In the morning I'd feed and then turn them out for the day. I lived in the country. I only discovered the GHO's fondness for my pigeons when grouse season started. As I slipped into a grouse cover near home, about 300 yards away, I flushed a GHO and he was allowed to fly until I started finding piles of pigeon feathers under different pines and alders in the thicket. I also had a Goshawk raise the dickens with the flock one winter. The Goshawks only were in a problem in the winter when they dropped to lower elevation for the winter. The Coopers didn't seem to bother the pigeons but raised heck with my Mom's fryers from time to time. I also had a weasel get into the loft one winter and cause a little problem for a night or two until he stepped in the wrong place. Back then the predators were eliminated when they caused trouble but not just as a general rule.
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Cats are smart and very wary
. Your German friend would likely do the trick. My friends from Labrador have a hard time with all the trees we have. Search "cat arrow" and although some of the pics are fakes, I think it is a bad idea to try to kill a cat with an arrow - although apparently it is tried frequently.
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Vince Pagliaroli
Well-known member
Steve our area of rural western NY is over run with Cats. Recently one person was arrested for having over 200 in her house, and that's not the first time it's happened. Animal rights folks here Love feral and all cats, and Gawd forbid you should snuff one. You in Big trouble. We have wonderful nature preserves, county parks, state parks, and NWR's yet the feline issue is never addressed, bad politics if so. I'd say on the same scale as killing hawks...