Do Sparrowhawks Kill & Eat Rats?
If your talking about the birds we call sparrowhawks here in the UK and in the rest of Europe then yes but not that often.They mainly hunt birds.In most areas a sparrowhawk’s diet will consist of 90-95% birds and only 5-10% other prey such as small mammals and reptiles. In the USA (and I believe in Canada) the word sparrowhawk is used to describe the birds we in the UK and Europe call kestrels.They will take small birds but much more of their diet consists of ground living animals such as large insects,mice and voles and young rats.They are capable of killing adult rats but don’t do so that often as an adult rat is at the very limit weight wise of what they can lift into the air and fly off to a perch with and they don’t like to eat on the ground.
