Sparrow Hawk

[alwaysshariff]

I now live in St Agnes, Bristol. I have a small garden in front 3m wide. And I have a peanut feeder and a feeder for small birds. I get chaffinches and sparrows coming to feed daily. I had two chaffinches last year and now I have four. I have seen a couple of green woodpeckers just once in the early morning in the summer. This morning a sparrow hawk came in and all the birds escaped from it and it flew away. Is this common to happen in the middle of a big city? I mean a sparrow hawk.

[Foz]

Sprawks can been found in most major cities, they adapt very well.
Gardens with feeders in them are the sprawks version of McDonalds, great drive throughs
They will return to sites where there are feeders, even sit on them and wait for birds to come to them, but only around 1 in 20 attacks will succeed, and if the bird numbers fall they will move on.

[alwaysshariff]

Thanks Foz, I think I will wake up early tommorrow and keep my eyes peeled with my camera. Whole day the other birds have not return to feed. I feel excited.

[fairplay]

Originally Posted by alwaysshariff

I now live in St Agnes, Bristol. I have a small garden in front 3m wide. And I have a peanut feeder and a feeder for small birds. I get chaffinches and sparrows coming to feed daily. I had two chaffinches last year and now I have four. I have seen a couple of green woodpeckers just once in the early morning in the summer. This morning a sparrow hawk came in and all the birds escaped from it and it flew away. Is this common to happen in the middle of a big city? I mean a sparrow hawk.

Hi there !
I was born in Bristol in '48 and spent my first 20 years there, but I just cannot recall the name of St Agnes - I know St George and St Anne's, so where about is St Agnes please ?
Being a city of big open spaces (hopefully still) I'm not surprised you have Sparrowhawks around, I believe there are also Peregrines along the Avon Gorge now. Probably there when I was a lad, but I could only identify sparrows in them days !

Neil.

[willing to learn]

Originally Posted by Foz

Sprawks can been found in most major cities, they adapt very well.
Gardens with feeders in them are the sprawks version of McDonalds, great drive throughs
They will return to sites where there are feeders, even sit on them and wait for birds to come to them, but only around 1 in 20 attacks will succeed, and if the bird numbers fall they will move on.

Wheres this figure of 1 in 20 come from
Regards
Colin

[Jason Green]

Afternoon Colin,

Originally Posted by willing to learn

Wheres this figure of 1 in 20 come from

Frequently on this forum! Either 1 in 19/20. I have no idea where it came from originally though, and would be interesting to find it out. Surely it would vary though; an experienced adult would catch morev than a youngster, as would birds in residential garden aeas than one in the countryside due to higher concentrations of prey. It must be an average over a studies' findings IMO.

I'll try and find out

Take care,

Jason

[aeshna5]

In Professor Ian Newton's monograph on the Sparrowhawk he states that little information is available on attack success, but quotes from data (1950-51) obtained from the bird observatory at Falsterbo, Sweden gave a success rate of 12%.

That would make 1 out of 20 rather inaccurate!

[willing to learn]

Originally Posted by aeshna5

In Professor Ian Newton's monograph on the Sparrowhawk he states that little information is available on attack success, but quotes from data (1950-51) obtained from the bird observatory at Falsterbo, Sweden gave a success rate of 12%.

That would make 1 out of 20 rather inaccurate!

Sparrow hawks hunt in various ways, one way is low flight using the contours of the land to aid its approach staying unsighted to the last possible moment, taking its victim by surprise ,they also take a stand at a vantage point and wait till it spots movement from its prey and then launch an attack. Its also capable of going on the soar and prospecting and is able to put in stoops that would make a peregrine proud. While in transit they might make a faint attack, just to chance their luck and see if any bird is slow to respond, if so they will follow through with a full scale attack. A Musket of some 5 1/2 oz's +, and he has to keep the female and her young chicks may be up to 5 and in a few cases more, in food until the chicks do not required to be brooded perhaps some ten days or so, then the female will also hunt for food. There would be not enough hours in the day, or would the Musket have the strength to launch a couple hundred of full scale attacks to secure meals for his mate and brood. During the winter the blood sugar would soon be depleted if he got anywhere near 20 full scale attacks, If the blood sugars do drop low they tend to start fitting. Females are only around the 9 oz + mark.
I lived nearly most my life watching wild UK raptor's Plus flying and breeding many species of native BOP. I tend base my findings on what I and friends have actually seen and witnessed.
Regards
Colin

[Wild-Woman]

Sparrowhawks are frequent garden visitors, especially where there is a healthy population of garden birds. Sometimes they will successfully kill in the vacinity and leave the evidence as a pile of plucked feathers (end of feather intact-a fox chews them off).
They're fabulous birds and I always marvel at seeing them perched up on our garden fence.

[Foz]

Hi Colin,
I base the figure of 1in20 on a little study I did last year.
I have 5 sprawks that visit my garden most days, the 2 females tend to take larger birds and have a very good kill rate ( taking carrion crow, jackdaw, magpie, wood pigeon and collared dove), the males go for the small birds, and always start with the brightest coloured ones first!
Bullfinch, green and goldfinch seem to take most loses when there are good numbers, starlings if thats all thats about, and sparrows seem to be the last choice on the menu.
I forgot to say that the females tend to hunt as a pair, the mother and thats years immature female teaming up.