Good squirrel hawking with Farrah

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!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Classic (Farrah) squirrel hawking

Image
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...
Read more

Cisco's a bit languid when he's an ounce heavy

Image
I have the birds at the weights that I want them at this point. They both molted quickly with nice feathers coming in and the old one's dropping off fast all summer. But the last little bit is taking longer. I fed them a little bit light during the trip out here; the decrease in their input may have triggered something in their bodies. They're both doing fine. Farrah has not molted a single feather since we were in Houston. Cisco dropped a a few more on the trip. He actually got a little bit low on the trip out. Not dangerously, but lower than he's been in a pretty good while. He dropped a few feathers since early August when I left. Not surprising that he's lagging a Bay-winged Hawk in his molting speed. I'm deliberately keeping them about an ounce over hunting weight, but I'm feeding them everyday, which means something completely different from being an ounce over hunting weight on alternate days hunting season feedings, After every hunt, each bird gets a cou...
Read more

Not a bad morning

Image
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...
Read more