“Raptors Have the Upper Hand” (or have they?)
Just how much do raptors cost the game industry and for that matter the small syndicate shoot that can ill afford substantial losses in or around the pens? Nor might I add the financial implications of releasing more than one normally would to compensate for the losses to predation.
We found it unacceptable to wander round the pens retrieving the carcases of dead poults, apart from which it is distasteful simply to allow predators the luxury and I have to say not particularly hygienic within the pens.
Moreover releasing an excess of birds simply to feed raptors is like having landfill sites and not wanting the problem of Seagulls sixty miles from the coast, unfortunately they are inextricably linked as are pheasant pens and raptors. Supply a glut of food and suffer the consequences, it is no good complaining about the population boom when we are responsible for it and then do nothing to redress the balance.
If I reared pet rabbits and a fox continually ate them I would be castigated for simply rearing more rabbits to accommodate, I should be expected to do something by way of stopping the fox.
So we did, we had quite a problem with owls in one pen and could have between three and eight poults killed every night, not all these were eaten but all were killed in the same manner, for a small shoot that soon mounts up and becomes financially unacceptable and for a keeper, disheartening.
We tried all the usual methods with little effect, the flashing road lamps etc; not good enough, we needed something stronger and came up with the Night Light.
A unit with a high intense xenon strobe that comes on at dusk and goes off at daybreak.
We can only assume that the intensity of the light is more than their sensitive eyes can cope with,
I know it’s more than I can do to stand and look at it.
Through the day was a greater problem, we suffered from Buzzard, Sparrow hawk, and Goshawk all of which are consummate professionals in the killing game.
We tried string across the pens, hanging cd’s, hanging carrier bags, reflective surfaces of all shapes and sizes, normal scarecrows dressed in a variety of guises and if I say so myself we had some of the best dressed broom handles in the country.
All of which did no good what so ever (sound familiar).
Enter the “Predator Deterrent” we can turn this unit off and have raptor kills within a couple of hours, turn it back on and like a wand it stops them instantly. You can set the units timer from twenty seconds to approximately thirty eight minutes and if you tell me you didn’t jump when it goes off you fib. It is the combination of sound and movement that clearly will not allow predators to stay in or around the pens. With a siren and light independently switched it can be used night and day and is readily accepted by your poults.
It gives your poults the opportunity to acclimatise to the pens and get off to a good start free from something constantly trying to make a meal of them.
And at thirty pounds a bird over the guns we owe it to them and ourselves to do something about it.
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