So you’re upset that the hawk killed the quail, pheasant and turkeys before you could?
Last year I was sitting on my porch and I saw a Red Tail Hawk swoop down beside the far end of my deck. He came back up with a cat in his talons and flew off to a large oak to enjoy his snack. The cat was making an awful fuss.
Not upset, just observant.
Several years ago, I looked out my kitchen window and saw a momma turkey with nine chicks following her. A few days later, there were five chicks, then two. After that, I never saw her or the chicks again.
I once counted a covey of about 25 quail moving from one cover to another in my back yard. A couple of minutes later, there was another similar sized covey making the same trip. The following hunting season, there were none to be found.
Last spring, I saw a group of 14 pheasant chicks moving from underneath a tree to a bush, one at a time. By autumn, there were only one or two moving through the same area.
We can’t keep a cat. The longest survivor lasted about two years because it was black and white like a skunk, but now she’s gone too. About 20 other cats have disappeared in the same time.
Pheasant, quail and turkey are tasty, and I would like to eat them a couple of times a year, but there are too few to harvest by the time hunting season comes around.
However, every fence post is decorated by a fat red tailed hawk because somehow that particular bird is venerated by those who don’t understand nature, and are off limits. I have seen literally hundreds of them at one time sitting in a wheat field.
Years ago, every boy on the plains had a .22 rifle and the standing order was to kill every hawk they saw to protect the chickens. We don’t do that anymore and the hawks have taken over.
Red tailed hawks are a nuisance and a detriment to biodiversity where I live.