Magpie took goldfinch off feeder and killed.

bobbytwo

Just thought I would share this with you all. I have a bird feeder in the garden and yesterday a magpie flew down and grabbed a goldfinch that was eating from it. The magpie brought the bird to the ground and pecked at it until it was dead. Horrible to watch. Then the magpie flew off with the poor goldfinch.:eek:

staker

could you have saved it?

Thomas_S_Hunterson

staker wrote: »

could you have saved it?

While it may have been disturbing to watch, predatory behavior is common, normal and natural among wild animals.

staker

if it was horrible to watch, surely a decision must be made?

Rainbowsend

It is the natural progression of things, who are we to interfere with nature, animals and birds have existed perfectly well without us for centuries, yes nature can be cruel but at least they only kill for food.

mukki

OP was right...
if you interefered you would have scared off both birds, leaving a painfully injured bird to eventually die in a ditch somewhere

Funkyzeit

staker wrote: »

if it was horrible to watch, surely a decision must be made?

The decision was made...by Mother Nature...

mikemac

As they said on the Lion King, circle of life

Hammiepeters

Magpies have done very well close to human habitation. Fact.
In order for song birds/finches to do as well in same requires asssitance, feeders, etc. Fact.
Magpies are aggressive and destructive and kill songbirds. Fact
There are too many magpies in urban areas. Fact.
A cull is required.

Thomas_S_Hunterson

Interfering with nature is a dangerous game. Fact.

Hammiepeters

Sean_K wrote: »

Interfering with nature is a dangerous game. Fact.

Do you mean farming,fishing,mariculture,building,forestry,and most other areas of human activity? I see.:rolleyes: Sorry gotta go. My lioncloth is in the tumbledryer.

Boston

Hammiepeters wrote: »

Do you mean farming,fishing,mariculture,building,forestry,and most other areas of human activity? I see.:rolleyes: Sorry gotta go. My lioncloth is in the tumbledryer.

The different is, none of those activities claim to be preserving the natural order of things.

magicbastarder

Hammiepeters wrote: »

There are too many magpies in urban areas. Fact.

based on what criteria?

if it had been a sparrowhawk, would you have wanted it killed too?

Hammiepeters

Boston wrote: »

The different is, none of those activities claim to be preserving the natural order of things.

Neither does culling or reintroductions for instance. It's a desireable order of things, that is all. I would like to see less magpies.

Hammiepeters

magicbastarder wrote: »

based on what criteria?

if it had been a sparrowhawk, would you have wanted it killed too?

If they were in the same numbers; yes. Fact is raptors are shy of humans, magpies aren't. Criteria being. Seeing too many magpies these days in urban areas and not enough songbirds and consequently no sparrowhawks either.

magicbastarder

Hammiepeters wrote: »

It's a desireable order of things, that is all. I would like to see less magpies.

well, personally speaking, i'd like to see more scientific criteria used to initiate a cull than 'i don't like the animals'.

i've seen plenty of songbirds and plenty of magpies; we attract plenty of the former and quite a few of the latter to the garden, and i've never seen a single kill. the effect of magpies on songbirds is drastically overstated.

magicbastarder

Hammiepeters wrote: »

Seeing too many magpies these days in urban areas and not enough songbirds and consequently no sparrowhawks either.

plus, i think you may be getting cause and effect mixed up there. you don't see too many badgers in urban areas. does that mean magpies are killing them too?

Hammiepeters

Difficult to provide exact scientific criteria because it would involve counting all affected species in a sample area over a number of years. We know pretty much what their diet comprises of. We know roughly what the pop densities are around the 32 counties. We know that the species is relatively new to the country. It's not a matter of likes and dislikes. Cull them now.

Hammiepeters

magicbastarder wrote: »

plus, i think you may be getting cause and effect mixed up there. you don't see too many badgers in urban areas. does that mean magpies are killing them too?

You just dont seem to get it. And yes there are urban badgers now and urban otters too.

Funkyzeit

Hammiepeters wrote: »

.
Magpies are aggressive and destructive and kill songbirds. Fact
A cull is required.

I love these slimline 'facts'.

Did you do some research on the effects of Magpies on Songbirds that you'd like to share? No? Well the RSPB did....

"To discover whether Magpies (or Sparrowhawks) could be to blame for the decline, the RSPB commissioned the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) to analyse its 35 years of bird monitoring records. The study found that songbird numbers were no different in places where there were many Magpies or Sparrowhawks from where there are few. It found no evidence that increased numbers of Magpies have caused declines in songbirds and confirms that populations of prey species are not determined by numbers of their predators. It is the availability of food and suitable places in which to nest that decide the population. "

Hammiepeters

As I said difficult to prove. But really ? ''populations of prey species are not determined by the numbers of their predators'' Of course they are.

Latchy

I wouldn't have interfered for the same reasons I wouldn't interfere with a Lion bringing down a Gazelle on the African plains .

Like the spider catches the fly ,the big fish eat the litte fish .It's the natural order of things .

Funkyzeit

Hammiepeters wrote: »

As I said difficult to prove.

So you still think they should be culled without any supporting evidence? Just wondering - not picking an argument....

Hammiepeters

Funkyzeit wrote: »

So you still think they should be culled without any supporting evidence? Just wondering - not picking an argument....

I would be happy to see them culled. Yes.

magicbastarder

Hammiepeters wrote: »

You just dont seem to get it. And yes there are urban badgers now and urban otters too.

i'll explain it to you so. you talk about reduced numbers of songbirds in urban areas with the clear implication that magpies are to blame, without considering that in an urban area, you will see fewer songbirds regardless of the number of magpies.

listen, it's okay to dislike magpies. it's traditional in ireland, there's a legend that they arrived with cromwell. just stop trying to invent reasons to support your dislike.

i've seen birds of prey on maybe four occasions over the last few month or two; on one occasion a bird was carrying a rat.
i've seen hundreds of magpies in the same time period, not a single sighting of one killing or carrying prey.
i'm not trying to claim the above is anything approaching a scientific analysis, but i would have expected that if magpies were the great threat to songbirds that people claim, that i'd have seen some sign of predation on the magpies' part.

radharc05

FACT ...
I was driving down to Dungarvan recently and there were Magpies attacking a Pigeon.
I pulled in and went over to said Pigeon, picked him up (he's hurt his wing)
(hardly part natural progression being hit by car or something is it/)
Brought him to vet
Released two weeks later.

Bad Magpies.
But in saying that I'd help one of them too if they were on the recieving end of something.

And dont tell me otherwise.. its just the way I am.:D

Tea drinker

Don't like to see any bird or creature killed... ok maybe snakes :-) ... but maybe the explosion of magpies should be managed? I know that shooters will deliberately target them as apparently they kill some game. Dunno how true it is.
When I lived in T'allah ( tallaght) I saw a gang of 14 magpie. It felt like a scene from a hitchcock movie. They are an intelligent aggressive bird who on the face of it could easily disrupt the eco-system...

magicbastarder

they are the ecosystem. or part thereof.

Tea drinker

magicbastarder wrote: »

they are the ecosystem. or part thereof.

No, they are part of the changes to the Ecosystem brought about by humans. It's whether we undo/manage that change we already made with no idea of consequences

magicbastarder

there's no evidence that magpies were artificially introduced to ireland - in fact, the first recorded sighting suggests that they arrived on their own.

staker

i would've intervened, i am after all a bird lover and am part of nature.

Amalgam

staker wrote: »

i would've intervened, i am after all a bird lover and am part of nature.

Then you would have denied an animal a meal. If you want to be oversensitive about a situation presented in a open forum, fine, but don't brow beat other members over something that, without intervention and allowed to progress to a conclusion, is a perfectly 'natural' event.

bobbytwo

I posted the initial post about seeing the magpie killing the goldfinch. It all happened in twenty seconds so no chance to save it even if I was inclined to. Thought I would have heard more people saying that they have seen the same thing...so maybe this isnt as common as we think. I know they raid nests and take young but adults must be rarer.

To all you magpie haters....last summer I did see a grey crow doing exactly the same thing to a young magpie that had only left the nest. The grey crow was only interested in killing it though, he left it there then.

And NO! Couldnt have saved it either!!!

Tea drinker

bobbytwo wrote: »

To all you magpie haters....last summer I did see a grey crow doing exactly the same thing to a young magpie that had only left the nest. The grey crow was only interested in killing it though, he left it there then.

Yeah, the grey crow have a bad rep as well. Obviously he saw the young magpie as another unwelcome beak at the trough.

bobbytwo wrote: »

And NO! Couldnt have saved it either!!!

Ha ha - I like your style

staker

Amalgam wrote: »

Then you would have denied an animal a meal. If you want to be oversensitive about a situation presented in a open forum, fine, but don't brow beat other members over something that, without intervention and allowed to progress to a conclusion, is a perfectly 'natural' event.

very much an over-reaction yourself no?
i'm not here to brow beat any poster regarding their own actions,nor yours either,but starting a thread on the issue to instigate discussion allows me to my opinion surely?
where have i brow beaten?
if it looked that way i apologise,it wasn't in any way my intention;i asked op could he have intervened seeing as it was so 'horrible' and then a whole faction riles me on my opinion!!

kmick

Magpies have become a serious pest around where I live in D6 however my damn buddhist nature does not allow me to kill them. The only satisfaction is they are liable to be re-incarnated as unemployed bankers in the next life.

Banrion

kmick wrote: »

Magpies have become a serious pest around where I live in D6 however my damn buddhist nature does not allow me to kill them. The only satisfaction is they are liable to be re-incarnated as unemployed bankers in the next life.

Nature is just a cruel bitch. I probably would have run out hysterically, flapped my arms like a demented buzzard and cried....(thats what I do when our dogs fight at home).
But sure you couldnt intervene. Like another poster said, the little finch would have been left there dying. The magpie needs a kick up the arse. But thats nature. We're the ones putting 'right' or 'wrong' on the birds actions. As a matter of fact, his actions just 'are'...iykwim.
Nature is a bitch.

sorella

Lost a small kitten to a magpie a few years ago. Right outside the back door too.

They are noisy, nasty birds and I chase them off with noise now. If I had a gun I would...Our wee dog is trained to "see them off".

doctor evil

Nature is red in tooth and claw.

sorella

So?

quote=doctor evil;59411031]Nature is red in tooth and claw.[/quote]

luckat

I used to work for an apple farmer who lost huge amounts of fruit to the finches, which ate the buds and blossoms of the trees in spring and summer.

Every year he trapped hundreds of the songbirds and brought them to a Mr Finch (true!), who gassed them.

Should we have a cull of apple farmers?

Tar.Aldarion

Amalgam wrote: »

Then you would have denied an animal a meal. If you want to be oversensitive about a situation presented in a open forum, fine, but don't brow beat other members over something that, without intervention and allowed to progress to a conclusion, is a perfectly 'natural' event.

When I kill a person I'll be sure to tell the gardai this.

Amalgam

The animal doesn't know any better. There is a balance within most aspects of nature, but it doesn't follow some sort of blood free absolute. The birds are bound by their genetics and innate behaviour.

This new manner of understanding our surroundings, 'nature autism', is turning people into dolts, cut it with the dead end hyper-sensitivities.

doctor evil

sorella wrote: »

So?

quote=doctor evil;59411031]Nature is red in tooth and claw.

[/QUOTE]

I have to explain this or do you just not like the meaning?

Google circle of life.

Tar.Aldarion

Amalgam wrote: »

The birds are bound by their genetics and innate behaviour.

Oh, but we are not? We are special? We have a 'soul' or something other animals do not have?

It appears that if 'we know better' about a lot of things, we don't follow them, hmm, wonder why.

boneless

I was off sick for a week and this happens...