# 25

The morning dawned cold and colorless for a change. It was 9 degrees with a wind chill of -4. It would appear that I am going to have to put Hope inside at night. She seemed fine, but she isn't designed for it.

Karen and I have agreed to do a Raptor count in this area for Dec,Jan and Feb. each year. We kind of enjoy it as long as the gas isn't running 4 bucks a gallon. We decided to take the Dogs and Hope along with us. The Dogs because we would be gone most of the day, and Hope because it was another hunting day. Dare I say two birds with- Nah!

The snow has been hitting all around us, and the Mountains are lovely.

Steen's Mtn.

South Mtn. Idaho 

Owyhee Highlands, site of the fire last year.

Our route takes us through Jordan Valley, and around some of the side roads there. It is a 159 mile trip. We saw 64 different Raptors, Red Tails, Golden and Bald Eagles, Rough leg Hawks, Prairie Falcons, Sharpshin Hawks, Northern Harriers, Kestrels and two Great Horned Owls.

There were a lot of other critters, especially Deer. Karen counted 120 in just one field. If I was to guess, we saw well over 400 Deer today.

Just outside of Burns Jct the two white feral Horses were feeding.

This is the first time I have been able to see them without the plane.

They normally stay behind the Hill that you can see in the background.

We were able to get a picture of a Coyote mousing in one of the fields.

Just outside of Danner I took Hope out of her box to see if she could catch something today. She weighed 964 grams when I picked her up, so she should be able to turn with the Jacks today. We walked for quite a while and while she had many close calls, she could not get her toes into anything.

After walking over most of the area that I normally hunt, I put her in the box and we went on with our count leaving her to think on the reason that she was still hungry.

We continued our count into Arock and stopped at another of the fields that I have hunted in the past years. They have over grazed the property and it doesn't hold as many Jacks as it used to, but the Bunnies are thick and there are a few Jacks left there. ( Its private property, and I guess they can screw it up if they want to.) The Jacks and Bunnies were still holding all the cards, and I was wearing out. I made what was intended to be one last swing through some stuff that I hadn't hunted yet, and a Jack made the mistake of running across the open. When pressed he tried to take cover in a totally inadequate Sage. She grabbed him by one hind foot and held on. She was in behind the main stem holding him with her left foot. When I came up he swerved to the right and she grabbed him in the head with the right one, and soon transferred both feet to the head.

I was close enough on at least three attempted strikes from a height, that I could see her get stopped by the Sage limbs just before her toes would have made contact. Her aim was right on, but the bush was too thick. Ah well if it was easy, there wouldn't be any Jack Rabbits.

Swing and a miss

December here seems to be to coldest month for us. I personally find that strange since every where I have been previously, that month is Jan. Last Dec. was bitterly cold and below zero most of the nights, or at least it seemed that way. We have been below 20 degrees most mornings of the last week, and I think we are supposed to get colder than that for the next week or two.

We had a bit of snow yesterday. Just enough to see it in the seams, but Jordan Valley was reported to have 2-4 inches. There is an upside to all the rains going around us, since the snow does as well.

The really striking sunrises and sunsets tone down a bit in December as well. These were from the last day of November.

This is the Sunrise 11/30/16

I had intended to make this into a panorama shot

but gave up when I couldn't find the correct program.

This is looking East. We normally don't get all that much

color to the East at Sunset.

The sunset took a bit to develop. This is looking West.

The Deer coming back after feeding all day on the runway.

I picked up Hope this morning and found that she weighed 1003 grams. I guess I will get my wish concerning her top end. The last Jack she caught, she weighed 974 grams. Its colder than a well diggers butt, and she still can't digest all the food that I give her. Apparently I am turning into a soft touch in my old age. Some one should invent a Harris Hawk with a fast metabolism.

I was due to visit the fields at Arock today. They have a lot more cover than where we hunted at the ranch. Hope does better with shorter cover. There just aren't as many hiding places there. Arock however is just the opposite, and it always takes us longer to find one that screws up there.

While she did not pursue as energetically today as she did at 974, she still managed to catch a Jack for a little while. It however managed to get away from her before I could get there.

We put in four hours today and came home with an empty bag. Oh well, that means that I get to hunt again tomorrow.  

Number 24, again!

The weather yesterday was just too much to hunt, so I made Cinnamon rolls instead. Not a bad alternative. I'm not sure if that is what they meant when they said " Its an ill wind that blows nobody good".

                                         The storm front had blown into Idaho by this morning.

Karen had a dental appointment, so I decided to go back to the ranch to hunt after it warmed up a bit. It finally warmed up to 27 degrees by 11:00 AM, so I went out to get Hope. She weighed 980 grams this morning, the highest that she has ever been so far. I have decided that with the weather this cold, I am not going to worry about her weight. If she gets to where she is too fat to chase Jacks, I will consider taking her weight down. She was very anxious for me to pick her up, so she wanted to go hunting.

This is what the Mt looked like when we arrived.

We walked the length of the road, jumping a rabbit here and there. She had a couple of close calls that left hair hanging in the air, so I couldn't find anything wrong with her weight. After traveling the length of the area that holds Jacks, she began to get restless, sometimes moving out a bit in front seeming to hope that there was something there to chase.

I have always so far hunted the area close to the road and fence, as Jacks generally, for whatever reason, hold close to a natural dividing line whether it be a road or fence. This time I decided to go a lot further out, with the logic being that in my past hunts I had not gone out further than 50 yards, and while the cover was a bit thinner, the pressure applied by us was not present, therefore the rabbits would have noticed that the area had escaped hunting pressure by us. The rabbits were noticeably not as thick as they had been, so they had to be somewhere else. Logic indicated that they might be holding further out from the road. Nothing to lose, plus the cover was a bit more scattered, which would favor Hope.

I walked at least twice as far out than I had hunted before, and turned North towards the truck. With the scattered cover, the Jacks were jumping a bit further ahead. Hope was still giving chase, but a rabbit with the time to think, can generally escape. We had covered about half the distance when one jumped fairly close and Hope gave chase. It wasn't long before a scream announced a catch.

There is a Jack and a Hawk in this bush.

I put him out of his pain.

Not sure if you can see, but she is lying on her tail

I pulled her out of the bush, gave her the tin cup of tidbits, and picked her up to feed her. After filling her up, and putting her in the Giant Hood, I took the rabbit out to clean. I discovered that this was not the first introduction to Hope that this poor rabbit had.

He had only half of a tail. The bone had fallen off as well. There had been at least one or two who had lost their tail, but retained their lives, at least for a while.

This is what it looked like when we left.

another storm coming in.

Hope performed as well if not better than she had in any of her flights. We will see how much weight she can carry before she loses her desire to catch.