Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!att!cbnewsj!donnelly
From: donnelly@cbnewsj.att.com (jeffrey.m.donnelly)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: Re: Bird feeding Station
Message-ID: <1991Apr22.195905.24247@cbnewsj.att.com>
Date: 22 Apr 91 19:59:05 GMT
References: <1991Apr15.225115.3695@jpl-devvax.jpl.nasa.gov> <1991Apr21.142938.12830@yang.earlham.edu>
Distribution: na
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Lines: 33


YIKES!

This morning I saw a Coopers Hawk eating a bird that it presumably caught
at our feeder.  I didn't want to disturb it so I couldn't get close enough to
it to see what the prey was.  Judging from the size and the guests that
frequent our feeder it was probably a mourning dove (God they're slow).
(I must have missed the capture by seconds because it was still plucking
feathers)

Our feeder is sort of in the open with trees available about 8-20 feet
away.  I use a platform with a feeding station on a pole above it. This
works out nicely since some of the seeds that fall from the feeder land
on the feeding tray for other birds to eat.  Some seed does fall to the
ground and this is where the doves tend to hang out.

I understand that hawks have to eat too, but I don't particularly want them
eating the birds that come to our house to eat.  Feels sort of unhospitable.

What should I do if anything to make our feeder "safer"?

Will this hawk think "Oh great!  I never new this place was here, I'm gonna
hang out here forever"?

What tecniques might a Coopers Hawk use to catch its meal?
Like do they sit quitly in a tree waiting for the unsuspecting bird to turn
away?  Or do they just fly down and grab the first stupid bird that flys
in its direction?

Oh well, maybe the dove was sick and thus slower than usual.  One can only
hope.

Jeff (A somewhat shocked bird watcher/feeder)