Another hawk being strangled to death by a snake falls from sky in East Tennessee

A red-tailed hawk fell out of the sky last week in east Tennessee and witnesses say it landed in the road with a snake wrapped tightly around its neck.

People in Tennessee are apparently getting used to it.

“It’s happened again!” the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency posted Sunday Facebook. “If you recall, last year we had a juvenile red-tailed hawk entangled with a rat snake. Well, it’s happened again in Jackson County.”

Witnesses told state wildlife officials they saw a young red-tailed hawk snatch a rat snake up and take off, expecting to eat it for dinner. The snake did not cooperate, however.

“The rat snake choked the red-tailed and both fell to the ground,” the state reported. “They (witnesses) unwrapped the snake from around the bird’s neck and both critters were fine! The snake and bird both left!”

That’s exactly what happened in October in Smith County, the state said last year on Facebook. However, in that case a red-tailed hawk and rat snake landed in a man’s driveway and the bird nearly had its spine snapped by the snake.

“The gray rat snake had wrapped around ... a juvenile red-tail hawk, pulling its head back to its tail,” the state said. “The homeowner got a stick and separated them. Both animals carried on their merry way.”

Red-tailed hawks grow to a foot and a half long and have a wing span of 49 inches, the state wildlife agency says. They eat snakes, along with other “small to medium sized mammals,” the agency says.

Meanwhile, rat snakes grow to six feet in length and they, too, prey on small mammals. Rat snakes are constrictors, meaning they wrap themselves around their victims and squeeze the life out of them, the state says.

This story was originally published May 5, 2020 at 4:55 AM with the headline "Another hawk being strangled to death by a snake falls from sky in East Tennessee."