# Escaped from hawk chase and came home!



## FeralNinja (Oct 15, 2005)

My beloved female pet pigeon named "Pic Pic" somehow managed to escape from a hawk chasing her and came back! While I am not proud of letting my pigeon being chased by a hawk, I feel so much relived that she came back alive unharmed. I just want to share my story.

I've been somewhat free-flying Pic Pic (Shes about 7.2 years old) for almost two years (I hope I don't get flamed for free-flying her), until yesterday(last Sunday) I never had any issues with a hawk preying on her.

Because apartment we live in is right next to a local park, when I first moved in, I thought the place was perfect for Pic Pic to breathe fresh air, walk around, sunbathe, and free-fly while I am close her. 

I've been taking her out no further than about 200-250 feet away from where I live. I always carry her outside to same place. And she walks around at our usual place and sometimes she lands on my shoulder/hand and we walk back home. Or sometimes she flies back to home and waits for me at the door. And, when that happens, I run, at full speed, to catch her up. I also walked around the apartment complex while carrying her on my hand quite a few times to make sure that she's familiar with the area. She also sometimes rides a car with me whenever I'm going to a supermarket. I do that so she's familiar with the area outside of the apartment, so when something happens while I am no around, she knows how to get back home.

She's not trained, but I think she's well conditioned enough to be able to figure out how to get back home. My neighbors love Pic Pic, btw. 

Taking her out for a walk/fly worked out really well for years w/o any issues, and never had any close encounters with hawks. There were few times when a hawk would hover around very far from where we usually hang around. When that happens, Pic Pic always stays very close to me and never makes any sudden move and I grab her and bring her home.

So, at around 4 p.m. yesterday(Sunday), when it was our fourth time going outside that day (When I am not busy I go out with her more than 4 times during weekends), my worst nightmare came to reality. As usual, I carried her out to our hangout area, and she walked around there for couple minutes, and she flew back home and and landed on first floor balcony where I live, and as soon as I arrived she flew to my hand. Usually from that point I carry her inside, but this time, for a very brief period she looked very frightened and all of a sudden she flew towards parking lot area and then I saw a hawk chasing her. It all happened very quick. They both took left turns from where I was and disappeared from my sight. I ran as fast as I can to catch up with them but of course it was no use. I ran everywhere yelling "Pic Pic". While running around asked people at the parking lot if they saw a hawk chasing a pigeon. No one said that they saw it. I remember running everywhere yelling my pigeon's name, and I do not want to recall what was going through my mind, one of the worst mixed emotions I've ever felt in my life. I was running around for 10 - 15 minutes and during that time I even ran back to my apartment building, to see if she escaped and came back, but she wasn't there. From that point I started run around again for about 5 minutes and I spotted the hawk that was chasing my pigeon on a rooftop. I ran towards the building yelling my pigeon's name and the hawk flew away, luckily half eaten dead pigeon wasn't there. Hoping that my pigeon is still alive somewhere, I ran around again yelling her name for another 5 minutes, and ran back to home for the second time to see if she came back and there she was! She was standing right next to my home door, looking very frightened of what just happened to her. She was waiting for me to show up there! I grabbed her and took her inside and checked to see if there was any injury, and luckily there was none (no bloods, puncture wounds, or scratch marks). And I hugged (more like a hand hug with my face snuggled onto her chest) her and kept telling her that she's safe. She stayed right next to be for hours. She never left my bedroom and was scared to go to living room. Luckily a happy ending, but I DO NOT WANT TO RE-EXPERIENCE THIS EVER AGAIN!

Today, I was having flashbacks of yesterday's incident at work and still recovering. And my pigeon is still not confidently flying in living room area as she's still recovering from her emotional trauma (plus sore muscles???). I am just so glad that she managed to escape from being chased w/o being injured and flew back home. Will I ever take her outside and free-fly from now on? well... I DO NOT WANT TO EXPERIENCE THIS EVER AGAIN! So a definite NO!

It'd really suck for my pigeon though since she enjoys sunbathing during sunny days and loves to walk around her hangout area. All of that is taken away because of some hungry EFFED up bird! 

Below is a drawing of what happened:


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## Siobhan (Dec 21, 2010)

You can't blame the hawk. He was just doing what hawks do, and they have to eat, too. My pidge never goes outside and doesn't even want to go to our fully enclosed front porch. Yours will be fine staying inside. You could get a small cage or a pet carrier and take her out in that after she calms down so she could get fresh air and sun without being in danger, if she misses going out.


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