The message
from "David W.E. Roberts" contains these words:

Today, looking out on our lawn, there is a cluster of pigeon feathers but no
pigeon.

They weren't there about an hour ago.

The cats don't show any sign of pride in finally catching a piddy, and if
they have they have concealed the corpse very well and forgotten it very
quickly.

So methinks we may have a hawk.

We could do with one - there are a ridiculous number of pigeons around this
year and they keep pecking away at our plum trees.

Now wondering, if there is a hawk, where it takes its kill to eat.

Years back I saw one on the back fence with something in one claw, but I
presume they normally repair to somewhere discrete to partake of lunch.

We see Kestrels all the time, hovering over verges.

I presume that something which will take a full sized pigeon will be larger,
and hunt from a greater height.

Do they still hover, or do they drift around like the seagulls, just
looking?

Kestrels hover, but their prey is on the ground, usually small
rodents..they couldn't take anything as big as pigeons.

Sparrow hawks can take small birds the size of tits on the wing (high
speed, high-manoevreability fliers) but don't hover.

Buzzards wheel slowly around the sky on thermals (almost no wing
flapping) and take small animals on the ground, or carrion. They eat the
prey on the ground.

We had doves taken by a peregrine falcon, which picked them off the
roof ridge, carried them to ground some distance away and ate them
there.

They all have to eat. I don't much like seeing sparrow hawks kill small
birds on our birdfeeders, but since I like eating birds too, I'm in no
position to criticise.

About a week ago we saw something really odd; as we drove up our road
early in the morning, a largish bird of prey was sitting in the middle
of the tarmac, on something. It was the size of a buzzard but lighter
coloured on the breast. As we drew up, I realised the bird was not
injured, and not feeding on carrion. It was sitting on an abandoned
glove :-) and took off in a leisurely fashion as we drew up.My guess is,
an escaped/lost hunting hawk of some kind.

Janet