A tiny Chihuahua barely escaped serious injury in Manhattan's Bryant Park on Tuesday when a trained hawk swooped down and scraped it with a talon, according to press reports. Had the pooch not been leashed at the time, it might have become a real-life urban legend — Cf. 'The Pet Nabber' in the 'Encyclopedia of Urban Legends' (W.W. Norton, 2001) by Jan Harold Brunvand:
A small pet — often a Chihuahua, a miniature dachshund, or a toy poodle and usually belonging to tourists — is snatched by a large bird, generally an eagle, an owl, or a pelican. Such things do happen, although the more likely predators on pets in many regions might be coyotes.A miniature dachshund wasn't so lucky in a similar incident reported in Halland, Sweden earlier this year when a golden eagle 'made a meal' of the unfortunate pet. (And let's not forget the legendary dog-eating catfish of Germany... may it rest in peace.)
Comments
Amusing as this may seem, this actually happened to our daughter’s 6-month-old Yorkie. We let her out at 11 PM to let her go to the bathroom. When we went out to get her, we watched in horror as she fell from the sky and landed on the road in front of our house, breaking her tiny neck and bleeding badly into her brain. The hawk in question landed on the neighbors roof and watched as we rushed the puppy to the vet. Despite valiant efforts, she had to be put down, and our 3-year-old, as well as our entire family, is heartbroken.
I too had this happen with my maltese/toy poodle. Fortunately for us the results were not another heartbreaking story. She fought him off and only had a minor wound on the inside and outside of her thigh, I think she weighed a little more then he could handle and got more then he bargained for with her. We are grateful and much more careful now.
It’s possible, It might have happened. I have seen a similar incident happening.