re: Spinoff: Outdoor related falsehoods people believe

Are y'all seriously arguing over terminology? Smh

quote:

---

A red tail can CARRY about 1/2 its weight. A HUGE red tail weighs 3.5 lbs.

---

They eat on the ground.

quote:

---

They eat on the ground.

---

This is the statement you disagreed with.

quote:

---

Hawks carry off dogs/cats/small children.

---

I'm going to side with the resident hawk master as to the abilities of hawks.

quote:

---

That inbreeding occurs in the wild and that we know what is the potential outcome of said inbreeding in deer herds.

---

Never heard of this one, but I would assume it can eventually become an issue in high fenced herds.

quote:

---

I'm going to side with the resident hawk master as to the abilities of hawks.

---

Thanks.

I may not be the leading expert on most things on this forum, but if any of these sumbitches wants to argue with me about Red-tailed Hawks, he better know what he's talking about.

And yes, occasionally, a hawk will attack a small dog or cat. I said they don't fly off with them. They can't, unless it is a VERY small puppy or kitten, like less than 2 lbs. Even then, they'd be far more likely to eat it where they killed it. My red tail has caught 64 head of game this year, mostly squirrels which weigh 1-1.5 lbs. She's flown off with zero of them. Because she can't. If she catches one up in a tree, and hangs up long enough to get a good grip on the squirrel, and think about what she's doing, she might glide down away from the tree a bit. But she can't fly off with them. And she's a big, female red tail.

So, if your 4 lb weiner puppy is missing, a hawk didn't swoop down and carry it off and eat it. If you find it half-eaten in your yard, maybe. Still very unlikely, but maybe.

quote:

---

Must depend on the squirrel because there's lots of pics with red-tails flying just fine with them.

---

There are some small squirrels out there. There are some half-eaten squirrels out there too.

See if you can find a photo of a red tailed hawk, up in the air with a full grown squirrel. See if you can find one where it's clear the hawk isn't just gliding down out of a tree. There's probably a photo out there, but squirrels are smaller than the 2 lb limit I mentioned, and the photo isn't going to show how far the hawk managed to drag it.

Hard for me to determine fullgrowthness. Most are greys which are obvious smaller, but that last fox looks to have a nice set on him.

A big grey squirrel might weigh much over a pound, right? I've never thought to weigh one.

Big thumper fox squirrel might go twice that, but that's a very large one I would think.

I'm going home to shoot a full grown grey squirrel out of the yard. I'll report back with a weight.

Only one of those is more than a foot off the ground, and for all we know, he just exited the top of a big oak with it. Like I said, a big hawk can probably carry a small squirrel. But, I'm telling you, they're not flying off with anything over 2 lbs.