OMG-Just found a Sparrow Hawk in my garden

A timely warning -
I just looked out of my window to find a sparrow hawk in the middle of my lawn, plucking the feathers out of a very large pigeon.
Heart beating 50 to the dozen, I dashed outside to see the hawk flying off with the pigeon.
My bunnies had only just been running about in the same place, whilst I was out with them, cleaning out their loo.
Just getting over the shock that it could just have well been one of the buns.

Has anyone here ever lost a bun to a bird of prey?

bunnyhopper said:

A timely warning -
I just looked out of my window to find a sparrow hawk in the middle of my lawn, plucking the feathers out of a very large pigeon.
Heart beating 50 to the dozen, I dashed outside to see the hawk flying off with the pigeon.
My bunnies had only just been running about in the same place, whilst I was out with them, cleaning out their loo.
Just getting over the shock that it could just have well been one of the buns.

Has anyone here ever lost a bun to a bird of prey?

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It does happen

Not a nice sight for you to see but I guess it's just part of the 'circle of life'

I would make sure your buns are in a covered run if they are not already in one :roll:

They have a huge covered run but I let them have all the garden if I am outside, hanging washing or gardening or cleaning them out!! Shall think twice before doing it again.

Yeah I agree, its not nice and better to be safe than sorry :?





This lovely girly left the body of the bird in my garden but the head was nowhere to be found :shock:

we've had one in the garden recently taking sparrows (well how predictable!0 but two bird watchers who I asked said it would be extremely unlikely to even attempt anything other than the smallest of the small netherland dwarf. I am a bit surprised at the pigeon even - as they are designed to catch by swooping down and lifting off with the prey before settling elsewhere to eat it.

Fab, if upsetting pics mindymoo.
I have just googled sparrow hawks. The one in my garden was brown, not grey as in your photo. So it was a female
'The female takes prey up to wood pigeon size, but the smaller male doesn't catch anything bigger than the mistle thrush.'
Maybe can breathe a little easier.

It did not seem to have any trouble lifting off with pigeon cargo, and flying off with it. Pigeons are lighter than rabbits though..... I hope.

I don't think a bird would swoop down if you were there. (Hope not anyway) and I agree most domestic rabbits are probably too big.

It is scary though. I always tease the buns cos they freeze if they see a seagull shadow or all go dashing off and I normally go. 'oh noes, is it a hawk is it gunna eat yous'. Now I feel bad.

Hi :wave:
Don't worry... a sparrowhawk, even a larger female would never go after a rabbit... as has been said, pigeons would be their largest prey, but usually nothing bigger than a collared dove.
Buzzards on the other hand will, and once quite rare in Norfolk, they are becoming more common... I see a pair nearly every day where I work. :shock: Very worrying, but I have been assured that they can only hunt in open spaces, and will only go for wild coloured rabbits! :?

But then you have got your occasional escapee eagle owl....they are scary! :shock:

Nice pics Mindymoo. ETA... I think your birdy is a male though.

We've got a female sparrow hawk who uses out garden as one of her hunting stations... She taks the pigeons, usually, but I once rushed out because she'd come down on a starling and it was fighting back, so there was all this angry shrieking for 20 minutes or so - until I realised what was causing it and went to go and intervene. It was making me feel bad!

I was out in the garden, a few days afterwards and the rabbits were in their runs... when she - the sparrowhawk - dropped from a tree at the top of the garden and swept right past me. I think she blames me for the starling that got away. :lol: I was so concerned at the time, as one of my bunnies was half the size she now is... But have since read they're really not very likely to go for a bunny. Our hawky does scare the bunnies, though! Sometimes they all thump and run for shelter in their runs, and nothing can be seen, although all the birds in the garden will have gone deathly silent... We just assume the hawk has passed over the house.

Those are beautiful photos, by the way, mindymoo. ^^

I've seen a lot of Buzzards this last couple of years.

Hi jbun1 - (my bunnies first foster mum, before I had them.)
Buns are fine, they didn't seem at all worried about the whole affair!
Any buzzards around here can buzz off.

bunnyhopper said:

Hi jbun1 - (my bunnies first foster mum, before I had them.)
Buns are fine, they didn't seem at all worried about the whole affair!
Any buzzards around here can buzz off.

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:lol: Good, glad they are ok.
About time you put some pics up of them both though.

jbun1 said:

:lol: Good, glad they are ok.
About time you put some pics up of them both though.

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Here is latest pics of them -



Sorry Sophie is mostly missing, she is usually to busy stuffing her face with hay to pose!

Moulting time has started too....

Hi....I had the same experience a few months ago in my garden,I was gobsmacked at seeing a sparrowhawk pulling a pidgeon to pieces(wasn't quick enough to take a piccie tho!)

It was an amazing thing to see so close up but I didn't realise sparrowhawks were even around here to be honest.

BTW your bunnies are gorgeous!

Awww thankyou.

Nice to see them, they look very happy.

Hi, we started having the smaller male grey sparrow hawk in the garden last year, he would take sparrows and other small birds within feet of us sometimes, never really seemed bothered whether we were in the garden or not. Our very tame robins has a very narrow escape a few times!

After he had done a pretty good job at decimating our sparrow population I decided to find out if there were any 'kind' deterants, that wouldn't freak all the other birds out. So I spoke to someone at an rspb centre who suggested puttinga few old cds or discs on strings and suspend them around the garden, in the trees that I'd noticed the hawk in, (they spin and flash and the hawks don't like them). I did and it seems to have done the trick, the other birds aren't bothered by them either. Glad that the sparrow population has started to increase again, I'd felt really mean as we'd actively encouraged them into the garden by creating a large (and very successful) nesting area for them by putting 12 concrete boxes on our huge rag stone wall and it seemed like we'd just created a superemarket for the hawk. If hawks are regular visitors to your garden don't be surprised if you find one dead or dying, they have an extremely high mortality rate as they are so focussed on their prey that they don't look where they're diving or at obstacles that might get in their way and so crash into things regularly. Had one time when it took the hawk 15 mins to recover on the lawn after crashing through bushes trying to catch one of the robins.

It was nice to see them up close (really close a couple of times - one time a hawk took a fluffy sparrow fledgling that I had been admiring which was only a foot or so away from me in a bush, I think I was nearly as shocked as the poor little thing), but I'm gald that they aren't regular visitiors any more.

bunnyhopper said:

Hi jbun1 - (my bunnies first foster mum, before I had them.)
Buns are fine, they didn't seem at all worried about the whole affair!
Any buzzards around here can buzz off.

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just noticed your location - guess where i'm from originally!!!! :wave::lol:


i believe a sparrow hawk landed on our fence once. we also had a heron land on our fence too :shock: that was a bizarre sight

When i had my outdoor buns at my parents we had buzzards and sparrow hawks (they have 60 acres behind the house), i used to let the bunnies loose with me in the garden otherwise they were in a covered secure run and i had no probs. Ive seen a sparrow hawk take a pigeon down and land on it in the middle of the road on a busy roundabout in southamtpon!! It stopped all the traffic, it just sat there and looked confuse dontop of this flapping pigeon for a couple of minutes and then flew off, the pigeon escaped!

Your rabbits are safe Sparow hawks only kill "on the wing" ( whilst is flight)
and they only eat birds! we have a sparrow hawks nest every year just along from out house, they fly over our garden as do Osprey, buzzard and Kestrel.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/wildfacts/factfiles/240.shtml

http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/features/sparrowhawks_songbirds.asp :wave: