Just wanted to share an update... unfortunately, the battle continues. We have been in contact with DNR & Wildlife services. They don't seem to be convinced that the Ravens are killing fawns and without actually witnessing the kill and having evidence, it doesn't seem like we will get any help from them. Just to be sure we aren't overlooking something, we have doubled down on other possible predators and setting live traps around our property. We have seen no evidence of fox, coyotes, or bobcats. We did have a couple of possums that we saw during daylight hours (around 10am) and raccoons at night. We have not seen or heard any owls or hawks. We continue to have continual presence of Ravens and Crows numbering at least 20 or more.
We know that many of the kills are happening during the daytime where we tagged a fawn in the morning, and find them dead later in the day. On some new fawns, we have seen tails that have been bitten and bloody. All of the fawns seem to have been attacked at the tail and then anus/rectum. We are finding the fawns mostly by seeing a group of ravens/crows fly up from the ground. They never let us get closer than about 300 yards.
We would love to be able to get one to hang up, but have yet to be close enough to get a shot off, but we continue to seek out this opportunity. We are also trying a couple of other things, one of which will be a broadcast of ravens and crows in distress and alerting to predators. While the company has a 100% guarantee, we are very concerned about how this will impact the deer. Has anyone tried something like this? Did the deer react to the birds distress calls adversely? We are going to start slow, but if anyone has experience with this please let us know. We are hoping the shipment arrives this morning so we can start install asap.
Thanks again for all the suggestions. I will try to update as I can.
