Cisco's 20th Season

Farrah came in at 805 this morning, 820 on the scale. 805 is good, just five grams over her theoretical hunting weight. We drove out to Brookshire, the Tweener Field across from Igloo plant. One of the few places left out west.  She was good and eager. Right out of the gate she missed catching a bird that should have been a gimme. Then a few minutes later Farrah had a great flight on one that dodged her on the grass at the last second. Very cool  We stomped around for a while and she snagged a couple of large grasshoppers. Finally she chased something in the tall grass by a swale. It was a big male cotton rat.  A caracara came into to check on that Harris's...

No, she didn't catch a squirrel. But it was fun. Farrah chased a squirrel for about a half hour. She was quick and responsive, no hesitating. She just got beaten. Harris's can be fun. Let's go!

This was another typical squirrel outing with Farrah. If she really wanted to catch squirrels, she could shame Cisco into retirement. Her maneuverability in the trees, her ability to fly almost straight up, and her skipping up vines, make her a potentially deadly squirrel buzzard. She has some downsides. Her footing is sloppy, and her grip is not quite what Cisco's is. Cisco is not the most powerful Red-tail I've encountered by far. His grip is respectable but not close to the crushing grip I've seen on a couple of others. And Farrah doesn't quite match him from what I can tell. Farrah gets to the squirrels and can get her feet on them with little effort when she wants to. But about the time you think she's going to grab one, she'll drift off. She's been bitten enough. Cisco catches an order of magnitude more squirrels almost exactly. And it isn't because I don't expose Farrah to squirrels as much, which I don't. It really doesn't make too mu...

It's still too warm, Cisco had his wings hanging a bit. I was sweating and Cisco was panting. Fairly early on though, in a good area with minimal ground cover, he  caught a squirrel twice, but lost it. When I recalled him at the end of the hunt, he had a single bite on his toe. Time for betadine and sylvadane.  I have the foundation people working around my house today, unfortunately they'll be there all week and Cisco will go to Jim ince's. I'm hoping that Farrah can tolerate the pounding noise and I'm not putting her out obviously. She'll sit on the perch in the office if it's not too noisy. I'll try to take her hunting everyday this week. 

 Everything should have clicked today. Cisco was at 900 grams, empty gut. I got out early, at dawn. After a brief run in with some crows, Cisco flew to a much better area to hunt.  Sunday, under less favorable conditions, we had an hour of chases. Far too much ground cover, and warmer, since it was two hours later. Today my goggles were fogging, which is never good. Cisco looked like this: No, he's not injured, not overheated, not low in weight, not tired, just reacting to humidity. I don't remember having a stellar day when he does this. We had a languid chase or two near the end. I finished the hour and a half by walking a huge loop around a small woodlot. Cisco followed on, usually not good when squirrel hawking. It indicates that your buzzard is in "tidbit mode," there are no squirrels visible, or that he's given up looking. Unless you happen to stumble on a really impaired squirrel, you're going home empty.

This place is okay for veteran hawks. Trying to enter a new bird here would turn her into a pet quickly. There are some jacks, but tons of uncatchable ground lizards. Both buzzards are distracted big time. A month from now, it will be good. I'm planning to come back in November. I will let Cisco catch a month's worth of squirrels in Houston and then bring them both back here. Farrah is doing a little better because she's following better. Cisco tracked a jackrabbit right to this bush and when we flushed it he watched it running off. This is the third or fourth Jack that he found and tracked. He's likely a little too high in weight and not in really tip-top shape. He's actually at his high flying weight right now. I don't want to cut him. He'll be different November for sure. Cisco is right in the middle of the picture in that far, far away bush. Farrah's following better and is tracking and chasing jacks a little bit. It's just that she...