Angel’s Shares Awareness After Her Cats Are Nearly Taken By Neighborhood Hawk
Angel here and I want to share some warnings and advice about Hawks in our community. My two cats have both almost been taken by a neighborhood hawk.
Our family has two precious kitties, Ms. Jingles, the old grumpy lady of the crew, she is 16 years old but still gets around pretty darn good, and Cheddar Boo, a teenage rescue kitty from the Daviess County Animal Shelter.
They are both inside/outside cats and love to enjoy the hang outside when the weather allows. Cheddar especially enjoys going out because he is a former barn cat turned shelter cat turned city boy. So, he loves to hunt and roam around. About six months ago both our babies came home about a month apart with injuries to their bodies. We didn't actually notice until they had gotten infected and swelled up. We called Dr. Richey and she came to examine them. She told us it looked like they had been attacked by something.
We figured it was probably the stray cats in our neighborhood. Then our neighbors trapped and got rid of all the strays and once again Cheddar came home with a horrible injury to his neck. It was so awful that his face swelled the size of a golf ball.
Joe, noticed a hawk, circling our cul-de-sac, and he has been watching where it goes. It lives in the trees beside our house. Now, Cheddar who is normally not afraid of anything has become scared to go outside for any length of time. Well, we can't have that and decided it is time to do something.
I contacted my friend, Nikki Christian, who is a Wildlife Rehabber for National Geographic. I asked first not knowing how to trap a hawk. She told me it is illegal to trap them but I can take measures to repel them.
Here is what she suggested;
- Purchase a great horned owl decoy or a bald eagle decoy
- Get a Bald Eagle Call.
Here is what you can do to protect them if they must go outside:
- go outside with them
- provide shelter for them to retreat too
- put animals out together
- do not ground feed birds
- feed your pets inside
- keep pets contained if they have to stay outside
- coyote protective vest