Yogi has been with us for about three years. She has been a lot of fun. She has been a pleasure to handle, She has tolerated the clumsy cautious hands of hundreds of kids that she has met at various educational venues. She has willingly hunted with every one that was willing to take her out.
I decided last year to give Puddy to one of our falconers on the West side of the state. Rabbits were down to almost bare bones in this area. Karen, due to her medical condition could not withstand the rigors of hunting the rim rock where the Jacks live. Tami's new son was too young to handle that as well. I did not care for the complications that arise from hunting two hawks, so a reduction in ranks was in order.
Unfortunately Yogi has decided that she does not want to hunt Jack Rabbits on her own. Quite frankly I found this to be astounding. I have seen her make the first strike on four Jacks in one outing. It is true that she had help almost immediately from Puddy, but I never would have imagined that she would not close with Jacks on her own. She is perfectly willing to catch any and all Bunnies that we could come across. This is the right and logical choice for a bird that has grown up in the wild, but unfortunately I cannot make that concession. This is Jack Country, and even those are way down in population. So Karen and I began a search for a new owner for her.
We settled on Sarah Morrison.
Sarah has been a member of Oregon Falconers Assoc. since she was 14 years old. I have watched her and her mother attend every meet that the club has held. She has proved her devotion to the sport, as well as earning our respect. When we found that she might be interested in a new bird, we approached her about Yogi.
Sarah and her mother, Sandy arrived last week to pick her up.
We made an attempt to take Sarah's other Harris out for a Rabbit hunt, but the weather was quite "springy", totally different location from what he was used to along with the drastic change in elevation and Townsen's Ground Squirrels every where guaranteed that we were wasting out time.
We did find a road killed Jack however that was furnishing breakfast to a Raven. Sarah immediately wanted to stop. ( My kind of gal! ) She gutted it there along the road, and bagged every thing but the hind leg that the Raven had been feasting on. The leg and the organs were left there for the bird.
The next morning preparing for their departure, Sarah began cutting up the Rabbit. Frank, our white cat did his best to eat as much as he could before she got it put up.
It will take Yogi a bit to get the hang of hunting in trees. I hope that Sarah has as much fun with her as we have had.
