Decisions

I have kept Jessie on the kite in an attempt to get her in really good condition. I am at the point in my life where quality is worth more than quantity. We could go over to the ranch and kill ducks most any time, and while I have a limited number of days that I will hunt. A head count is not what I am after. After all if Jess catches a Duck it will be two or three days before I can fly her again, as I don't eat the Ducks, they are all hers. Too many calories in most ducks to just slough it off right away. If I am only going to be flying ponds, then she doesn't need all that much conditioning, since the flights all take place in a limited area. However Creeks and ditches are a different story. Something always goes gunny bag and it is up and down until they wear us both out. The ducks dive in the creek, then she has to wait for the old guy to catch up, then it is dive back in at another spot. Besides "long winging" is a spectator sport for the most part. It is best that she have the stamina to make it worth watching.

It will matter little how high I get her to go for the lure. She has a height burned into her mind already due to my impatience and unwillingness to wait for a higher pitch, but at least she will be strong enough to hunt without stress. She will normally fly as long as she can, then go sit down on the hill side somewhere and recover enough to do it all over again.

I have brought her weight up to the point of insubordination, 880 grams at this time. So she is building muscle each time she flies. Today I put the lure up to 400 feet. It took her two minutes to grab the lure. At least one of those she was playing in the wind at 75 feet. The wind was blowing about 15 MPH or a bit more. It was strong enough that the kite could hold her off the ground. She finally let go after dangling over the ground for a minute or more. She lit on the ground and I called her to the fist for her food.

The wind this morning was dead calm. I checked the weather and it stated that we would have a 9-10 MPH wind about 12 to 3 o'clock. It came up at one, so I wasted no time getting the kite in the air.

I may go for Ducks tomorrow, if the wind doesn't blow. It is about time anyway.

Yogi

I have decided that I will quit flying Yogi, at least for a while, perhaps for the rest of the year. There is little around the house or even close to the house to warrant even trying. About the nearest is abut a 100 mile round trip to get to where there are enough rabbits to even try hunting. Then there is the matter of my bone spur. 

As you know I have been cutting her way way back on her food. Sunday I had driven out to the rabbit field, and she did little to nothing to make the trip worth while. I fed her nothing and took her home. I did not fly her Monday, and Tuesday morning we had a storm coming in. It was raining here at the house. I checked the radar weather and it appeared that I could have a reasonable chance of not getting both of us wet for at least a little while.  I drove into Jordan Valley to get some gas, then back tracked to the field. While there is a reasonable number of Rabbits there, they are staying in shoulder high Sage.

We walked for at least two hours, with her not really making any serious or effective shots at Jacks. Now if she was smart enough to be really serious we could have caught a Jack and I would have been happy. As it was she just wasted my time, and pain. I worry about the possible damage that I am doing to my foot with the bone spur, and quite frankly I am not willing to chance doing possible damage to it for no reward or reason. So I will look for a breeding project for her.  

Jessie's conditioning

I have not been saying anything about Jessie in the few posts that I have done. Mostly because there is little to report on. She is not yet in hunting condition and hunting opportunities are scarce. All the Ducks here are residents, and they are few and far between. There are next to none on the Creek. The drought has reduced possibilities and ponds to almost nothing. It will not take much to drive the Ducks that are there to other places that I cannot get to them, so I am biding my time until some arrive from the North, and Jessie is in good physical condition. Mostly the latter.

Jessie is a bit slower this year to build muscle than in the past. She is 10 years old, and I am sure that affects her ability to build muscle. She also hardly flew at all last year. Most likely the biggest factor is that I have her shaved to a razor's edge. Its hard to build muscle without the fuel to form its growth. Jessie is a bit of a handful if she gets the chance, and has bulk to spare. She triggered the somewhat spartan treatment by her actions. I have kept her hungry and given her the full "Patty Hearst" treatment in the hopes that we can bypass her usual mid fall rebellion. So far so good, but this evening I decided to put another ounce of weight on her.

I condition her by flying her on the Kite. Wind is vital for this exercise, and it has been a bit more than iffy. The last time I flew her was two years ago, and it took us about a week to get her in condition. At the moment we are up to about 300 feet with the food, and about 3 weeks so far.

For those of you who do not remember, I will explain how it is done. I have a Delta type Kite that is designed to fly straight up. With an 8 MPH wind it will lift a fair weight up to whatever height that you want. There is a "stand off" that is made from a coat hanger, that attaches to the line. That forms a point to temporarily  clip a fishing "down rigger" release that holds a short line with the food that is also clipped to the main kite string. When the falcon grabs the lure, the clip releases it to slide back down the line to the earth with the falcon.  There is 1800 feet of line on my reel.

The beauty of this method is that the falcon gets intense exercise without any of the tendencies to fly off and explore. This also reinforces the fact that where you are is where the food or prey is. There is nothing worse than a good point by your dog on game and the falcon is off on the horizon playing grab ass with another hawk. That also goes for Ducks on a pond. Invariably when the falcon returns it is generally about telephone pole high and the opportunity is long gone. Most if not all falcons are one shot flyers. With a Harris, or Gos a reset is no problem. With a falcon you go home and try again tomorrow.

The start of the exercise routine is a bit slow to start. Then when they begin to put on muscle, you can raise the lure higher pretty fast. When we began it was taking Jessie about 5 minutes to regain her breath enough that she could eat. Now at 300 feet she is taking less than a minute. If the wind holds, then I will give her another week, before I take her to the Ducks. I asked Karen to video her performance today so that you could see how she is doing. Normally when she is in condition she can fly for about 30 minutes or more. She is good for about 5 right now.

  https://vimeo.com/110735177     password-   owyheeflyer

A step closer.

The change for Yogi from having a partner, to hunting alone, has been a bit rough. She depended more on Puddy than I thought. It doesn't help that while Rabbits are better, they still have a long way to go before it is easy. I could use a bit of easy right now. I drove 52 miles one way to get her a chance at some Rabbits. Even with the price of gas going down a bit, we are still 50 cents above the national average for fuel. Just one of the handicaps of living in a rural setting. I am still not convinced that it is not worth it however. Sorry for whining.

There are upwards of 12 or more Jacks that feed on my lawn every night. I have no idea of how far they travel to do so, but I have not yet been able to find where they go in the day time. I took Yogi out here at the house the other day, and spent the better part of two hours walking all over with her. At a guess we covered two or three miles. We had four slips at Jacks. She missed all of them. I even went down by the creek to see if there was something down there. There was, sadly it was only Coots. They do not fly, they dive.

Yogi hasn't perfected her dive as yet, but it didn't stop her from trying. As you may have noticed, Harris Hawks do not have much in the way of water proofing. They live in the Desert, and every body knows" it doesn't rain in the Desert". I had a heck of a time getting her away from the Creek. She was convinced that she could catch one of them if she tried long enough.

I have been " turning the screws" to the old girl, as she is not trying as hard as it takes. Flying in a cast, she could hunt heavier than solo. The two hawks fed off each others energy and competitive spirit. Alone she is more inclined to going off on her own and waiting for something to show up. Needless to say, that pisses me off. Of course when I am in that frame of mind, she doesn't eat.

The only way that one can "discipline" a Raptor is through their food. She doesn't hunt, she doesn't eat. Sooner or later she will decide that she can wait no longer and put forth the effort that it requires to have something live in her feet. Of course that course of action requires some careful monitoring. One could end up with a dead Hawk, with too strict an application.

Our last several trips out, she has been pretty lazy about trying hard. I have been cutting her back. Thursday we went to Danner (52 miles- 104 both ways) and she just wasted our time. I didn't feed her squat! This kind of stuff is doubly anger inducing, due to the bone spur in my foot. I don't mind the pain, but I am a bit worried about what it is doing to the bottom of my foot. If there is a dead Rabbit at the end of the effort, it is worth it. Other wise, I tend to be a bit grumpy.

I didn't feed her the next day either, so this morning I had to either hunt her or feed her and lose the lesson that I am so desperate to get across. Naturally this morning was one of the few days that it has chosen to rain. Wind of 18 MPH is predicted for this evening. It was raining here at the house when I got up. We checked the radar and found that there was a rain cloud sitting on the spot that I wanted to go. The radar showed the clouds to be moving North, and since it was a fairly small rain cloud, I thought that it had a decent chance of moving off the area by the time I got there. I dithered a bit, then decided that I had to try even if we did get wet, I had to at least make the effort to give her a chance.

Every body here wants to get into the act. If I cut meat, I have an attentive audience.

It was 35 degrees outside, and spitting rain here. I did my chores in the near dark, and we headed out. She weighed 995 grams. 34.8 for those who resist change. In a cast of two she flew at 43 oz. I decided to go get some gas at Jordan Valley and stop at the field that I thought would give us our best chance on the way back.

The area that holds the Jacks is almost shoulder high, and a bird that doesn't fly smart is terribly handicapped. Yogi hasn't learned that as yet. We jumped several with no success. Wrong choices on her part every time. This picture by the way is not the heavy stuff. We ran several Jacks while covering a mile or more of Sage. It finally begin the sprinkle a bit, and I had left the tall stuff in the hopes that we could get a good flush where she had more opportunity to catch one. We started a Bunny and she was so close that she saw which hole it ran down.

Of course then I couldn't get her away from there. I did my best and cleared what rocks I could to see if there was any way that we could get it, with no success. She went back to the rocks at least three times. Then she checked every hole in every pile of rocks that she could find.

We were both getting a bit wet, when I decided to give it up. I was going to feed her enough to get her past a couple of days until the weather was supposed to clear. The car was in sight when she took off, made a pass at something in the Sage, threw up in the air high enough to turn over and slash down in the Sage. I heard a short squeal, so I took off to help, hoping that it was a Jack.

Unfortunately that was not to be, but what the heck she earned her keep this time at least. Of course this will only make her more insistent that she wait for the easy stuff, but at least she put out the effort, and I think I do remember asking the Gods to at least give us an even chance, even at a Bunny if there was nothing else. Who am I to scorn a gift from the Gods, no matter how small.

She got all she could eat, and we will continue our contest of wills another day.

Falconry meet

Since Karen is a Director for Eastern Oregon, attending an Oregon Falconers meet in Madras Oregon was not an option for me. Quite frankly at first glance, I have outgrown this kind of foolishness. Its kind of an "old school" type of thing I guess, or my "curmudgeon" gene is out of control. Then I meet some of the young ones that just cannot wait for the day that they are old enough to take their falconry test. I personally would not have guessed it, but I seem to like giving what ever meager knowledge that I have gathered over the years. Maybe I just like an audience that is too young to know that I am full of it?

Like most journeys the possibility of problems always exist. The further north we went the worse the weather was. The weekend was forecast for rain and wind. Lots of wind!

I took both Jessie and Yogi with us even though neither was either willing or able to hunt yet. We did pretty good this time. The only thing that we ( I ) forgot was my electronic varmint call, and the thumb drive with the hawking videos that I wanted to show. I finally found a varmint call in Riley,Or. Our intention was to leave a day early and do a bit of night hunting for Coyotes around Bend,Or.

The wind and rain came up as we started on Hwy 20 East. I had Yogi in a Giant hood and Jessie was sitting unhooded on a portable perch on the bed of the fifth wheel. When we got to the spot that we were going to camp, I discovered that the "Escape window" by the bed had escaped somewhere along the road there. The window blinds were fairly seriously destroyed. I went in expecting to see a totally deranged Peregrine Falcon. Even though there was a lot of water all over the computer, TV and bed, Jessie just seemed to want to know if I had anything to eat.

It was still raining, and I was trying to get the fifth wheel set up. I closed the door to the truck and only later found that I had locked the keys in the truck. God, I love being an old fart. At one time my mind was as sharp as one gets, now it is just an adventure.

The key that I had hidden somewhere in the frame of the truck, either no longer exists, or I have forgotten where I hid it. Same result however. We did get lucky in that Karen had kept her phone in her pocket. We had a comfortable place to stay out of the rain while we waited for the AAA guy to unlock the truck. One good aspect of this misfortune was that I didn't have to worry about locking the keys in again, as Karen thoughtfully reminded me every time I got out of it.

It was simple to get into the truck. The guy just took a wedge, drove it into the top of the door, and then took a wire and pushed the unlock button. I am going to have to include a wedge in my camping stuff I guess.

I found that it did not matter that I had left my Varmint call at home, as there either were no Coyotes in that area, or I did not fool anyone with the call that I purchased at Riley.

The falconry meets are designed to give all the falconers in the state a chance to meet, hunt, and mingle. It is supposed to be accompanied by a business meeting as well.

Karen had gotten roped into hosting the meet although it was five and half hours away from us.( At one time I didn't mind the fact that she could never say no. Now it seems to be a bit different.) The club furnishes the main course for the evening dinner. We will normally have between 40 and 60 people attending. She asked me for ideas. This is the main fund raiser for the club for the year, so I suggested Burgers, and as a bonus I agreed to cook sourdough pancakes for breakfasts. So after we had made a trip to Costco to buy supplies, we went to Home Depot to buy some plastic and Gorilla tape. A half roll of tape later we were waterproof again.

A former apprentice brought his Harris hawk to the meet as well, so we went off to see if there were any Rabbits around. Yogi hunts well with other Harris's so that would give her some incentive to get with the program. We found an area that had not been overrun with other falconers, but the Sage was waist high and so thick that there were tunnels rather than trails. We did jump a couple of Jacks, and I swear that I heard a rabbit squeal for a short time after Yogi went in the cover after it. If so she lost it just as fast as she caught it. We went on for a bit, with Ron in the bottom of a little gully, and I had kept the high ground. His bird started a Bunny, but it cut back giving Yogi a chance at it. This squeal was short as well, but it only stopped because the Rabbit died just as fast as she touched it. That girl has some big strong toes. For a change Yogi got all the food that she could hold.

Our dinner went quite well. George Meadows, Tami's sisters husband, helped me with the grilling of hamburgers, and we had food on the table in short time. Everyone brought some item to accompany the meal, so we had lots, mostly in the form of Carbs, but what the heck- everyone needs a sugar high once and a while.

Our meet place was at the county fairgrounds, so we had a kitchen and a nice room for our meeting. They were also renting one of the other halls for a Mexican wedding reception, so along with colorful dresses, we had a whole passel of little kids running amok. I put Yogi in the giant hood and Jessie back in on the kitchen table for safety. I have a chunk of carpet that I use for her portable perch, and at night she goes on the table, and in transit she is on the bed. I apparently was in a hurry when I did so.

I do not know where this towel came from, but it went into the garbage after she finally gave it up. Bored hawks are a lot like bored kids. They generally find something to get into.

I had to give her a stuffed Bunny that we had found somewhere, to get the towel. I then gave her some Rabbit to eat in exchange for that. So in essence both of my birds got a Rabbit at the meet.

Oct 15- searching for game

I have spent three days looking at various parts of the Ranch next door trying to find a population of Jacks that I could hunt without having to drive to get to them. It can get a bit expensive here, with the scarcity of gas stations locally. Considering I would burn two gallons just coming home from filling up.  Not complaining you understand, just explaining. Anyway, it is obvious that I am going to have to travel to find game in populations high enough to make it worth the effort. I have also developed a bone spur on my right foot, so the higher the population of Rabbits, the less walking that I have to suffer through.

I made some calls this morning to re-establish contact with the Ranches that I have hunted on in the past, and loaded Yogi in the car to see what is actually there. I also put my Varmint calling gear in to see what the Coyote populations are where I want to hunt.

Yogi is down to 1045 grams, and seems to be ready enough to hunt. There is a patch of Lava owned by two different Ranches, that has had good populations in the past. I checked the first side and found that the rancher had put a very large bunch of Cows on it, so decided to go to the other side which is much more extensive.

We began jumping Rabbits within 80 yards of the car. Yogi acted as though she was going to catch one, but only if it made a serious mistake. Well Jacks do not voluntarily"slip the mortal coils of this life" quite that easily. In fact the darn things are downright hard to catch. After an extensive hike around several hundred acres of habitat, that seemed to hold a good number of Jack Rabbits, it became quite plain that Yogi was looking more for volunteers than victims.

Perhaps she thought that they came prepackaged. She showed a lot of interest in what this box might hold.

She didn't get all that much food, compared to the exercise that she got trying to see if anyone wanted to surrender. I will check her again Saturday to see if her enthusiasm for surviving has kicked in enough to try just a bit harder.

Once she was loaded I drove further out the ridge line to an area that should hold Coyotes, and set up my calling gear.

The Ranchers in this area hire a Helicopter each year to gun the Coyotes. They kill large number of them as you might imagine. There was also something else going on with the Coyotes, and one theory that I have heard was that Parvo played a large part in the die off of Coyotes. I do know that they were scarce every where that I hunted last year. Where you used to hear Coyotes calling from several different directions, there is almost total silence.

I called from my setup for about 30 minutes and saw nothing at all. Confirming to me that there is nothing to stop the Rabbit populations from booming in the next year or two.

Oct 14- progress

The weather is changing a bit. Beautiful sunrise's are one of the indicators that make the changes worth while. It also heralds the arrival of winds. That is good, for me at least. I need the wind to be able to exercise Jessie. The apparent scarcity of Helium handicaps her building muscle to be able to fly well enough that she will be able to catch the Ducks that will soon be legal to pursue. One cannot buy Helium any more, at least not without some serious coercion.  So if the wind blows, I can get a Kite high enough in the air to make her work to get high enough to be able to catch the lure.

If I just take her out and turn her loose, she will fly in a short circle and try to get me to toss her the lure. I don't like to "lure fly" her,  ( swinging the lure and keeping her from grabbing it, is a form of exercise) since what I really want her to do is to get as high in the air as she can. With a balloon or the kite I can make her climb as high as 800 feet to be able to get the lure. What makes a successful falcon on Ducks or any other game is the height that she will maintain over any game that we flush. The higher she flies, the more ground she can control. The speed of gravity is 120 MPH. The best speed a duck can manage is 60 MPH. Jessie pumps towards the ground, so her speed is multiplied. It is said that Peregrines can fly at 250 MPH. in a dive. The faster the closing speed the less the effectiveness of any evasive maneuvers. So for her to go up as high as she will is paramount to her success.

I first flew Yogi this morning over at the Ranch. She was finally down to a weight that made her a bit more amenable. I took her to the field that we had flown two years ago. It was lousy with Rabbits. That was then. Today I only found one Rabbit in the entire field. There was little to no sign on the ground that a Rabbit had even visited the area. However looking at the ground for sign has its rewards as well.

This one is a new one for me. It is made of "Chert". Very delicate material, and I was quite surprised that it was still in one piece. To my limited knowledge, it appears to not be "indigenous" to this area. Oh well, it brightened up my day. Most of the Indian bullets that I see here are pretty coarse and a lot smaller. What most would call small game or bird points, but I guess Rabbit points would be more accurate.

Yogi needed a refresher on the Lure, so the day wasn't a loss. I know where not to go, Yogi got some exercise, and now knows that the lure can hold some good stuff.

The wind came up more and more as the day wore on. It was finally hitting 17 MPH and a bit more. I drug out the kite anyway with some misgivings. I replaced the wooden crosspiece for the kite with a fiberglass one. Wind this hard will snap the crosspiece for the kite and makes a mess. The only thing that I needed to worry about now was whether the kite would be shredded by the wind.

Yesterday I put the kite up, had it baited, and went to get Jessie. The wind had been steady, but as soon as I took Jessie's hood off the wind died and Jessie flew out in a short circle and waited for it to hit the ground. ;-/  After she had taken the lure the wind came back up and lifted the kite nicely back to where it should have been. Sigh!

That was certainly not a possibility today. I put the bait up about a 100 feet, and went to get Jessie. I looked up before I went into the weathering area and discovered that the lure had torn away from the release clip and fallen to the ground. I went back and reeled it back in, refastened it and again went to get Jessie. The same thing happened again.

This time I decided to take Jessie with me, sit her on the quad that I was using for a kite holder, get it in the air and hopefully get her in the air before the wind whipped and snapped it loose from the release.

This time it stayed up, and Jessie, reveling in the wind, went for a good fly. She flew for about 10 minutes, mostly out of sight. She finally worked her way back and managed to grab the wildly dancing lure and brought it to the ground. A few more days like this and we can begin to build some muscle on the girl. Season opens this weekend, but she isn't ready yet.

Jessie's second day

Jessie is such a funny bird. I suppose that along with what she has been taught (sometimes inadvertently) along with the age she was taken from her mother, her behavior is a bit different from all the other Raptors that I have worked with. Most Raptors do not seem to have quite the personality that this one has. I can watch her as I approach her block and know that she is going to mess with my mind.

Above is the proof that she can be a serious and fierce hunter, but she has an independent streak in her a mile wide. She just can't help herself. This is our 10th year together, one would think that she would know the parameters by now.

Her serious flying weight is 870 grams. That translates to 30.5 oz. Big for a Tundra Peregrine. Most will hunt in the 26 oz range. When she killed the Goose above she weighed 32.5 oz. The weight range that raptors will still cooperate with their handlers is generally less than 1/2 oz. More than that and they have a tendency to not be serious and screw around rather than hunt. Attitude is the only thing that seems to work with Jessie.

This morning I went to get her and the routine go's like this. I wear my hawking vest that has all the stuff that I need, and she has seen it enough to know what it means. This morning she acted as though I was an intruder. I knew that she was hungry, since I did not feed her yesterday. She has been fed every morning for the last year, and she always meets me at the end of her leash to get her food. This morning she flew the other way when I began to reach down to pick her up. I let her go to the end of her perch, and gave her the opportunity to get on the fist and get fed. Nope! nothing doing. So I stand up and hang my glove back on the wall. Now she realizes that once again as has happened for 9 years, I am leaving and with me, goes her chance to eat, perhaps for the entire day. Now she wants me to pick her up, but of course that isn't going to happen. Like I said, she just can't help herself.

I came out later, no vest, no glove, but now she is begging forgiveness. Fat chance. I continue on to my exercise routine. I will feed her later in the day. Evenings are better anyway.

Finally around 4:30 PM I put on my vest and go into the weathering area. She is pumping her wings in anticipation. This time when I offer her my fist she steps up like a lady. I weigh her and find that she has dropped to 800 grams. She can go as low as 730, but I prefer not to. Weight is strength and calories is muscle. She needs all she can get, but we need to go through this dance every so often for some reason.

This time I am introducing our new dog, Brick, to the equation. We got him this spring and he is new to hawking. He is very obedient, and will learn very quickly what this is all about and how much fun it can be. Jessie has accepted him as ours, but being careful is warranted.

Its quite hot and it doesn't take Jessie long to decide that the lure is the place to be.

I call Brick to me, and give him the praise that he deserves. We watch together while Jessie eats her food on the lure.

A little praise and his enjoyment of the situation is quite obvious.

All Betsy wants is for Jessie to hurry up and leave the scraps to her.

This is her natural place to be when Jessie is on the ground. She is her protection until I can get there. Very necessary in a land of Eagles and Coyotes. Don't be fooled by Jessie's nonchalant attitude. She is better than a watch dog. Anything strange and she will voice her alarm and war cry. Her trust of Betsy has been earned and deserved.

As soon as Jessie abandons the Lure, Betsy is checking for the leftovers. Guts might not be what Jessie likes, but Betsy is not so picky.

After she is secured a trip to the shade is the next order of business. Frank the cat isn't about to be left out either, so soon the fam damily is gathered around the source of tidbits.